Teaching economics to elementary students is tough. I’ve been there – and I feel you!
I’ve had to teach “financial literacy” to kindergarteners, then basic economics concepts as a second and third grade teacher.
Years of experience has allowed me to learn a lot along the way about how to effective teach economics to elementary students.
Invest in Picture Books
I love to use my front-facing bookshelf to spotlight books related to our current science or social studies unit. It’s a great way to consistently refresh the highlighted books and to give students extra exposure to content. It’s great to expose students to a variety of new texts and help them learn those tricky vocabulary words.
You can find a list of my favorite picture books for teaching economics in this blog post, or on Amazon.
Of course, there’s no need to spend your hard-earned money on books for every unit. I love to use the library for this!
Integrate Content
I also love to use picture books related to economics (or whatever our current unit is) to teach reading minilessons. Again, it’s a good way to provide that extra exposure to vocabulary and concepts.
If You Give a Mouse a Cookie is perfect for your reading lessons and to help you teach goods and services!
Read more about it here and grab this freebie.
Project-Based Learning
One of my favorite parts of teaching economics is watching students turn in to entrepreneurs. By creating desktop stores, students learn about producing, resource types, pricing, plus supply and demand.
It is truly so much fun to watch how students’ hard work culminates on Desktop Store Day!
Read more about desktop stores here.
Choice and Voice
There are so many research-based reasons to implement student choice in your classroom. I personally love to offer students choice by using choice boards that are intentionally designed. To learn more about why I’ve found choice boards to be a valuable resource in my own classroom, check out this blog post.
Find this economics choice board here.
Do you need lesson plans and resources?
To meet the needs in my classroom, I created my own economics unit.
This unit is designed to cater to all students’ needs and learning preferences. Inside the unit you will find visual aids and picture sorts for visual learners, song lyrics and stories for auditory learners, and hands-on activities for students that need to create their own understandings.
See the economics complete unit here. (It includes needs/wants, goods/services, and saving/spending.)
What are your favorite tips and resources for teaching elementary economics? Share in a comment below!
