Jonathan Kifolo
Author · Ambit Adventures
Picture books that teach children how money actually works — by showing it to them, rather than explaining it.
Jonathan Kifolo believes financial literacy should be for everyone, which is why he writes for the youngest possible audience.
He spent his career as a financial regulator and now works in technology. Along the way, he and his fiancée built Ambit, a budgeting app for grown-ups. They built it after finding that every alternative wanted either their bank credentials or a monthly fee.
The books are the same conviction aimed at a younger audience. Money makes sense to a four-year-old if you show it to them instead of explaining it: a compass named Ambit, a piggy bank named Penny who counts coins by sound, a map named Atlas who knows where everything is, and a pile of coins that has to go somewhere.
They’re on paper on purpose. Ambit started in a house where the budget lived in a hand-written notebook.
The Ambit Adventures picture books are for ages 4 to 8, with early chapter books and activity books alongside. More on the way.
He lives in Warminster, Pennsylvania with his family.
Ambit loves finding coins and keeps every one of them in a secret pile behind the bookshelf. But a pile isn’t the same as knowing what you have — and when he meets Penny, a piggy bank who can count any coin by sound alone, he learns something better than a big pile.
Buy on Amazon →
Twenty-one big pages to color: meet Ambit, Atlas and Penny, hunt for coins in six rooms, solve a maze, count the coins and fill the jar. Printed on one side only, so markers can’t bleed through.
Buy on Amazon →Everything below is free, with no account and no sign-up — and nothing leaves the device it’s opened on.
A hide-and-find game across six rooms of the house. Plays in any browser.
Play →A real tracker for birthday money, allowance and chores. One tenth goes to Polaris.
Open →Coloring pages, a money chart, bookmarks and a read-aloud guide for grown-ups. Eight to print.
Print →Author inquiries, school and library requests, or anything about the books:
jonathan@jonathankifolo.comTeachers and librarians: there is a free read-aloud guide for Ambit Goes to the Bank — questions to ask before, during and after, and what to do next. No sign-up.