Words that Count: Financial literacy for 14 to 19-year-olds

Words that Count is a free financial literacy programme run by National Literacy Trust and created in partnership with Experian and Foundation 92. Now in its fifth year, the campaign aims work in collaboration with football foundations and community sports organisations to empower young people aged 14 to 19 to feel more confident and informed about making their own financial decisions.

The programme includes six in-person workshops delivered by community role models, covering topics such as income, tax, budgeting, debt, credit, money mindset and money safety. Additionally, a complementary digital campaign supports the initiative. This campaign features well-known influencers in the field of financial well-being sharing their tips and advice on TikTok and Instagram.

Literacy skills play a crucial role in enabling young people to bolster their financial resilience. Integrating financial education into literacy lessons throughout a young person’s education proves to be highly effective. In 2019, we published a report exploring the association between literacy and financial capability.

We found that:

• Children and young people who have good reading skills are four times as likely to have good financial skills than their peers who have poor reading skills (35.6% vs 8.8%)
• Children and young people who have poor reading skills are four times as likely to also have poor financial skills (56.3% vs 12.3%)

Students on the programme improve their understanding and confidence of financial literacy. Our evaluations since the programme launched in 2022 has shown that:

• Almost all students agreed that they knew why it was important to save money following the programme (90.7%).
• More than 4 in 5 (85.8%) said they are better at managing their money and 80.6% had increased their knowledge on where to get money advice.
• More than 4 in 5 had an improved understanding in all financial concepts, such as security and saving (87.3%) and debt and credit (86.5%).

The programme also positively impacted on deliverers’ knowledge and confidence to support their learners’ financial literacy:

• Only 3 in 10 (30.0%) teachers reported feeling confident to teach financial literacy before the training, more than 4 in 5 (81.8%) felt confident to do so after the training.
• After the training, almost all teachers (97.1%) agreed that they felt more confident in their ability to develop strategies to teach financial literacy.
• More than 9 in 10 teachers felt the training improved their understanding of the importance of financial literacy (91.2%) and the challenges associated with teaching the subject (92.6%).

We are looking to work with sports community organisations and selected FE settings in England who have access to disadvantaged young people, aged 14-19.

Each setting will receive:

• Programme training
• All necessary resources:
  • Student workbooks
  • Lesson PowerPoints with lesson notes
  • Lesson plans
  • Glossaries
  • Activity cards
• Limited financial support is available for eligible organisations (such as community-based sports organisations. This does not include FE settings or those that already receive statutory funding).

The programme will be available from October 2024 until the end of June 2025. You can register your interest in delivering Words the Count by completing the form below.

If you have any enquiries relating to this programme please email sport@literacytrust.org.uk.

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