Social Studies - Economics
During my lead teaching, I planned and implemented a social studies unit on economics. Throughout the four week unit, we discussed needs and wants, goods and services, producers, consumers and service providers, trading, bartering, community helpers and the marketplace. For this unit, I used a variety of kinesthetic, hands-on and technology-based activities to keep students engaged, as well as to meet the diverse learning needs of all my students. Below is a calendar of lessons and a sample lesson plan from the unit.
Economics Unit CalendarClick on the link below to see the calendar for my economics unit.
Economics Lesson PlanClick on the link below to see a sample lesson plan from my economics unit.
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 A Venn Diagram to sort needs, wants and things that
could be considered both a need and a want. | ||||
Producers and Consumers Lesson
To encourage my students to apply what they had learned regarding goods and services, trading, and producers, consumers and service providers, I helped them open their own class business. As a whole group, we decided to produce monkey cupcakes for our third grade buddies, who would be our consumers. In exchange for a cupcake, our third grade buddies traded us an imitation dime. We also made advertisements to promote our product.
Click here to see our Monkey Cakes commercial.
 Above: Brainstorming ideas for our Monkey Cake
advertisements. |
 Above: Our Monkey Cakes.
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 Top Left Corner: Reading over the recipe for our Monkey Cakes.
Top Right Corner: Putting in the ingredients for our Monkey Cakes. Bottom Left Corner: Putting the Monkey Cake batter into the cupcake holders. |
Dramatic Play
To supplement my unit, I turned the pretend play area into our classroom bank and marketplace so the students would have an opportunity to role play.
 Above: Our classroom bank.
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 Above: Our classroom marketplace.
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Above: The students role play in our classroom marketplace.
