“My 17-year-old likes to buy his clothes from Abercrombie, he goes to movies with his friends, and often asks for money to do things with his girlfriend,” a mother of two teenagers told me recently.

“He does really well in school and is a good kid. We can afford to support his activities and we almost always give him the money he asks for. But we’re beginning to wonder when he’s going to wake up and realize that it actually costs a lot to pay for all his fun.”

Chances are, I told her, he’s not going wake up any time soon. According to financial literacy experts, parents need to teach their children, especially their teenagers, financial accountability.

One father of three teenagers felt that his children needed a four-alarm awakening. “I was tired of being a bank. My kids are great, but they were living in a dream world,” he said. “I sat them down and told them how much money I made last year. Their eyes popped out of their head. I then took a pad of paper and showed how much I pay in taxes, how much I pay in tuition, how much I pay for our vacations, how much I paid for their camps, how much it is to maintain the house, and the car, and the food, and the housekeeper, and their clothes. I went on and on, and finally, they got it. If someone had told me to do this, I would have been offended by the idea, but it was the best thing I’ve ever done.”

Candid information sessions are endorsed by financial literacy experts.

“It can be quite enlightening to keep track of the inflow and outflow of cash for a month or so,” the Web site practicalmoneyskills.com, which was created by Visa and Junior Achievement in order to advance financial literacy, advises. “A little accountability goes a long way to handling cash and credit wisely.”

Joline Godfrey, author of “Raising Financially Fit Kids” (Ten Speed Press), counsels parents to ask their teenager to select a profession that will provide an income by age 25. Then, using a Web site such as Monster.com, have the teenager find an entry level job in this field. Have them list that income on a balance sheet, as well as budget amounts for housing, savings, food, health care, transportation, and the other expenses of daily adult life.

“Giving kids a chance to ‘practice their fantasies’ in some reality-based way may feel like throwing cold water on their dreams. But not helping them to expand their visions in ways that allow them to attain real independence may cheat them of a full, secure, and satisfying future,” Ms. Godfrey writes.

Another way to gently nudge teenagers away from financial dependency and encourage accountability is to require some kind of work experience.

“My younger daughter is on a tour of Europe,” said a mother of two teenagers, 17 and 15 years old. “But when she’s home in August, she’s going to work as a temp in an office. In all of August she’ll earn a fraction of what it cost to send her on the trip. I hope that makes her think twice before she asks for a new pair of jeans this fall.”

Insisting that teenagers contribute to paying for their clothing, entertainment, transportation, charitable contributions, even education, are ways of adding purpose to their internships or summer jobs.

Another financial hurdle looms: Almost 10% of American teenagers have credit cards, and at 18 or 19 years old, that percentage doubles, according to a poll conducted this year by Junior Achievement. “Alarmingly, 15.7% of teens who own credit cards make only the minimum payment due,” the pollsters report.

“I gave my 17-year-old son a credit card to have for emergencies,” a mother of three said, “but then I noticed there were all sorts of charges on it. We made him pay the bill out of his own money. It’s easier to have him suffer now than to watch him wallow in debt in 10 years.”

She’s right. According to a recent Senate report, the fastest growing group of bankruptcy filers is 25 years of age or younger.

Most teenagers are not ready to have their own credit cards, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t explain to them how they work. When a teenager can explain why it would take him more than nine years of making minimum payments and almost $2,000 in interest fees to pay off a $1,000 balance on a credit card with an 18% annual interest rate — then perhaps he’s ready to have his own card.

sarasberman@aol.com