Tips for Teaching the Economy in an Elementary Classroom
- Use Interactive Notebooks!
To teach the Economy, I focused on these skills: wants, needs, goods, services, supply, demand, consumers, producers, and scarcity.
I used an online interactive notebook through Google Slides which includes anchor charts of these topics as well as interactive pages for students to practice these skills and for me to assess their learning.
There were some days when I used the notebook as a whole group teaching, and then others when I assigned students to use the anchor chart to complete the activity page on their own. It is super easy to connect to Google Classroom, too! Just create an assignment and link the interactive notebook to the assignment. Students loved having ownership over their learning and they were very engaged to complete the assignment in the computer lab or on the iPads on their own!
Get This Google Economy Interactive Notebook At My TpT Store!
- Use Brainpop to engage students
In addition to using the Interactive Notebook, I found some great resources using Brainpop. Brainpop has three student friendly videos about the economy, including Needs and Wants, Goods and Services, and Saving and Spending. Students always love learning from the robot, Moby, and his friend Annie. Find these videos here!
These videos are short and concise, but are a great launching off point for a conversation about the economy. I often watch these first, have a short conversation, and then have students show what they know and reinforce their skills in their Interactive Notebook!
- Have a fun, final project!
I love finding ways to incorporate Project Based Learning into my classroom. My students were so interested and engaged about learning about the Economy, that I knew that this would be a great place to incorporate PBL. After researching a few entrepreneurs (like Steve Jobs, Martha Stewart, Milton Hershey, and Thomas Edison) students learned that each of these entrepreneurs started by wanting to fix a problem. I had students research an entrepreneur and then find 3 facts about their entrepreneur to add to a Padlet!
Students then brainstormed problems that they saw in their daily life and community. Students came up with problems such as dangerous pet toys, littering, and pesticides in gardens. Then, students were told that they would have the opportunity to become entrepreneurs and think of a product that could solve the problem.
Students developed creative products such as the Hollow Pet Toy: A pet toy that had edible and safe stuffing for dogs to eat, The Easy Trash Remover: a bin that automatically sorted recycled materials and trash, and E & C Ladybugs: a company that offered a mailing service of Lady Bugs that you could put on your garden to keep your plants safe without the pesticides.
Once students had developed their product, they researched product names to decide how they would name their company, they developed a prototype, and they even used their persuasive skills during writing to make a commercial!
Hopefully these tips are helpful for you to feel excited about teaching the Economy! I was extremely happy about my kids excitement to learn about the Economy and everything that they added to our conversations!
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