Introduction:
This is is wonderful game
for elementary age children to learn about money, and how it is used. It
is an activity in which each child can come up with their own answer, different
from those around them, yet still a correct answer(1). However, there are
not so many answers that you can not control how you are running the class.
Yes, it is true that more than one answer is right, but it isn't as overwhelming
as it may seem (5).
Prerequisites:
In order to successfully
complete this activity, students must have basic knowledge of money, and
how money is used in everyday life. (You may choose to introduce your lesson
by talking about the uses of money.) Students must also be able to tell
the difference between coins, and know how much each is worth. By having
these tasks accomplished, your lesson will run much smoother (2).
Time Needed:
The amount of time need to
complete this activity would be up to you. This could be used as a one day
lesson, but if you chose too, you could extend the activity to last longer.
In order to do this, you would make the lesson somewhat easier on the first
day. On the second day, you could add more coins or bills (if not all were
used on the first day) to make the lesson more complex (12).
Materials:
The students should use actual money to "think with." This will help them to transfer the activity from math class to real life situations (9 & 10).
2 one dollar bills 10 nickels
4 quarters 10 pennies
10 dimes
What to do:
Theme: The main focus of this activity is to show the students that there are different ways to pay for something that costs the exact same amount (8). For example: to pay for something that costs 35 cents, you could use 1 quarter and 1 dime, or 7 nickels, and so on.
Suggested Class Plans: Start the class by pairing the children, try to put the med. children with the low or high children. It is best not to put two low children together, or high and low children together. However, it is up to you. As soon as everyone is paired off, allow the children to explore the manipulatives with each other and talk about what they already know. Start your lesson by asking the children what they learned while they were exploring the manipulatives. Use what they say to guide to your lesson. Here is an example:
Ask the children to put 15
cents on their desk. Walk around and see how many students chose a dime
and a nickel. Check to see if anyone used pennies. Ask the children to share
with the class how they made 15 cents (7). Explain that everyone's answer
is a correct one, yet some are different from others. Do the same with 45
cents. Compare the different children's answers to each other. Ask if one
is better than the other, or if they are the same. Ask the children if anyone
has ever chosen not to use a specific coin for any reason. Share comments
with each other. Continue the lesson by using higher and higher numbers
and compare the students answers with each other. Check to see if every
combination of coins were used. If not, see if they can come up with another.
Be sure to talk about different methods of counting the money, and the different
ways to group the coins. Also, talk about anything that came p during the
exploration of the manipulatives, answer all questions (6 &11).
Keeping everyone on task:
The best way to keep everyone on task is to make sure that you have paired your children in the best possible way. It is to your advantage to take time to pair everyone together. This will keep the noise level down, and help to keep the children on task.
It is also helpful to make connections between the lesson and the children's lives. This will help them to want to learn more (15).
Follow up Activities:
There are many different
activities you could do as a follow up activity for this lesson. One activity
you could do would be to bring some things to class and allow the children
to "buy" them, while you kept track of what coins were used. After
the activity, graph and discuss your results.