discussed back-to-school budgeting with their children and only 22% have made a list of back-to-school items to purchase.

Further, while 48% of parents have discussed the difference between needs vs. wants, 36% have not discussed back to school finances at all with their teens.

When asked about the

topics they'd most like to learn about, teens expressed interest in all areas of money management.

Surprisingly, they showed the most interest in learning how financing works for large purchases such as a car or a home. Roughly 74% said they would like to learn more. Other popular interests for teens include learning more about investing money (72%), identity theft and how to protect themselves (68%), saving money (62%), budgeting (58%), stocks (58%), checking accounts (55%) and credit cards (55%).

When it came to purchasing choices, however, the

survey held few surprises. Clothes and traditional school supplies such as

notebooks, backpacks, pens and pencils continue to top back-to-school shopping lists this fall.

Just 7% of parents and teens expect to purchase hand-held electronics such as PDAs or iPods, compared to 10% who planned to purchase these items last year.

Parents and teens differed slightly on computer spending--4% of parents expect to shop for a new a computer this year, while 7% of kids hope to do so.

Over 92% of teens expect their parents to join them on back to school shopping trips. This year, 52% of parents expect to spend more than $125 on back to school essentials for their kids, while 27% plan to spend less than $100. Overall, the majority of parents (72%) say they will be spending the same amount as last year; however, 16% plan to spend more. Most plan to pay with cash (69%) and credit (33%).

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