Money, Money, Money!

The teaching of the money is something that has a clear relation with the real-life of people, even of our students. For this reason, since they are young, they should start to be familiar with its meaning and the characteristics of each one.

In my opinion, the best way of learning money is to practice and manipulate it.  Therefore, the creation of role-playing could be an interesting idea to do it since the youngest children.

We can create a roleplaying in which children create their one coins and perform a role in a market. In the market, they will have to buy some products and sell others. I think it is such an interesting way of familiarizing them with the idea of the price of the products. Furthermore, it will be so interesting for them because they will create their own market. As it is a task that involves a lot of subjects it won't be boring for them. 

This idea can be turned into a project for a trimester in which the subjects of Mathematics, Spanish Language, Foreign Language, Visual Arts are working to develop the competences of students. In each of them they can be involved in their part of the roleplaying, for example in Visual Arts they will be making the coins and the stands of the market, in Mathematics they will learn the concepts of price and the value of the money, and so on. 

Also, the roleplaying can be made several times along the trimester so children show their improvements and how their work is going on. 

I think this type of task is really interesting for students' cognitive, social and affective development and the advantage is that it can be adapt for all ages. Below you can watch a video in which a teacher of primary learners gives her experience working teaching the money. However, what is most interesting is that they are playing a roleplaying in which each student perform a role like I have explained. I think it can help you imagine the idea!

With children that are older instead of this roleplaying, can be interesting to develop their own breakout or household. They can be in small groups and create their own breakout in which they have to get a key to open the door and get out of the classroom. Each group will design their own questions clues regarding the topic of the price and the money. This option has the benefit that can implement other competences as the digital one because they can use QR codes or other types of resources to get out of the classroom.

Moreover, we can use games to work and review the topic of money during the preparation of the project. By this way, when they get the performance of the roleplaying, they will be good prepared by a different type of activities and exercises. The following games have are free and have been designed especially for the first and second cycle of primary education.

For the first cycle: El valor del billete, Equivalencias entre monedas y billetes, El valor de las monedas, Equivalencias

For the second cycle: Monedas y billetes, Euros con decimales

Finally, it could be really helpful to use Youtube or even board games like Monopoly to make them aware of the value of the money and its equivalences. However, as I have said, the manipulation in real-life will foster more significant and enriching learning. In the following video, you can see how easy is to create a game in which young learners can practice the counting of money. It is an example but I know you can imagine much more games!