Children Get Hands-on Financial Experience

By STEVE

Their classrooms couldn’t be more different, but Vicki Stanton and Rosemary Roodhouse seem to share a special feeling for teaching youngsters to be financially savvy.

Both teach elementary school: Stanton runs the School of Economics, a special program operated through the Blue Springs School District in Missouri; Roodhouse teaches fourth-graders at St. Paul’s Episcopal Day School, a private school in midtown Kansas City.

I recently watched Stanton and Roodhouse in action, and it was a joy to see. Clearly they have a knack for helping youngsters distinguish the meaning of wants and needs, scarcity, inflation, and other economic and financial concepts that even Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke would be hard-pressed to teach effectively.

Last week I wrote about the need for teachers to find fresh approaches to bringing financial education into their classrooms. They could take a page from Stanton and Roodhouse’s lesson plan. Here’s a glimpse at how the two teachers motivate students.

On a warm Friday morning in early May, about 40 fifth-graders from Cordill-Mason Elementary are sitting on the floor inside a cramped, flat-roofed single-story building that’s home to the School of Economics.

Itching to get started, their eyes are on Stanton, who rolls through the day’s agenda.

It’s a speech she’s delivered nearly every day this school year to the kindergarten through sixth-graders who have participated in School of Economics activities. Since opening in 1994, nearly 100,000 students have streamed through the program and learned that many routine activities in life boil down to economics.

Stanton, a teacher for 22 years and director of the School of Economics since 2001, is a firm believer in linking textbook lessons with hands-on activities. The school is basically a series of activity centers designed as a “mini society” – with storefronts, a bank, a CPA office and even a city hall – and the children act out roles in the community. Activities at the school are tiered for grade-appropriate skill levels.

Take the Cordill-Mason fifth-graders, who on this day are transformed into early-1900s immigrants who have just arrived at New York’s Ellis Island from Latin America, Europe, the Pacific islands, Africa and the Middle East.

With money borrowed from the bank, some children run an international bazaar of shops, producing jewelry, buttons, small toys and other small craft products. Other young workers filled jobs in the food court, preparing root beer floats, soft pretzels, tacos and more.

Once production was humming, Stanton made an announcement: The international bazaar was open for business.

Taking turns as consumers, the youngsters cashed paychecks at the bank and fanned out to visit the shops and restaurants with their play money. Amid the shopping frenzy, the financial education emphasis was on making wise choices.

By acting out roles, Stanton thinks, the children can begin to learn that running a small business, customer service, cashing a paycheck, and spending and saving money is more than just textbooks and work sheets.

“I can’t even think of all the lessons they learn,” she said.

Rosemary Roodhouse glides to the front of her classroom, sits on a stool and directs the auction to begin.

First up, one of her fourth-grade boys quickly pulls items out of a bag for inspection – a plastic Spider-Man toy, a bag of M&Ms, three highlighting markers and more. “What’s your bid?” Roodhouse asks the students in her classroom.

“Do I hear 20 tokens? she says. A hand shoots up. “Do I hear 24?” Another hand goes up.

“How about 25 tokens?” she continues.

Sold, and the satisfied buyer and seller huddle and make the exchange.

So it goes for the next hour.

Every student in the room has merchandise to sell, and there are plenty of eager buyers to snap up the goods.

“Kids don’t have a strong concept about economics and money,” she said. “This is all about decision making.”

That’s where the paper tokens come in. At the beginning of the school year, students receive the tokens, which they then personalize with colorful designs. The students are “paid” to come to school. Every day they show up, they get a token.

The currency is deposited in the Fourth Grade Bank of St. Paul’s, and students earn interest.

Roodhouse, a former Kansas economics educator of the year, designed the token activity years ago to tie in with her curriculum.

The auctions reinforce concepts such as supply and demand, pricing and inflation. Another exercise introduces the students to insurance. Pity the youngster who is victimized by a disaster (Dad’s car backed over the bike, for example) and has not kept up on insurance premiums.

You can’t go wrong mixing fun with learning, said Roodhouse.

Several students agreed. When asked to describe her experience in the class, one student offered these words: “If I don’t learn about economics now, when I grow up I’ll wind up living on the streets in a box.”

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