Optional Lessons & Games

Little Nino’s Pizza: The key concepts in this lesson are entrepreneurship and the relationship between consumers and producers. It centers on a story of a young entrepreneur and his father who make decisions about starting and developing a pizzeria restaurant. The story contains identifiable examples of consumers and producers, and the lesson includes fun activities to emphasize those concepts. This lesson does not require computers or Internet.

A Chair for My Mother: This lesson is based on a story about a girl who sacrificially saves money to buy her mother a comfortable chair after their possessions are destroyed in a fire. It teaches the economic concepts of delayed gratification, income, opportunity cost, and marginal thinking, while also reinforcing the character-developing value of giving. This lesson does not require computers or Internet.

Alexander Who Used to Be Rich: This lesson is based on a story about a boy who cannot buy the walkie-talkie he wants because he fails to save and makes a lot of poor – and humorous – decisions about how to spend his money. The story sets the stage for a follow-up discussion about opportunity cost, saving, and spending. The lesson ends with some math activities based on the story.

Ed’s Bank Game: This game from practicalmoneyskills.com is great for young students (grades 1-2) as it will engage them in making decisions about spending and saving and will reinforce their recognition of coin values.

Piggy Bank Tag Game: This is Ele:Vate’s non-Internet version of the Ed’s Bank game. It gets kids in motion–you will need a gym or an open field. The game teaches the same concepts as Ed’s Bank, yet may be of interest to older students (grades 3-5) simply because of the exercise involved in the play.

School Trek Trip Game: This game’s object is for the players to save sufficient funds over a period of time to enable the player to go on the school trip. Throughout the game, students will face decisions as to whether to spend or save, and they keep a running tab of their income/expenses in order to help them plan and budget so as to earn the school trip.

Budget Busters Game: Budget Busters! is a game about budgeting and choice-making that reinforces concepts and vocabulary from grades 1-4 Economics curriculum lessons.