Students learn best by doing

Over the past few years I have learned that a classroom library is much more than books with a variety of genres that students can read. I have learned about different reading levels, what a multicultural book is, and how literature is connected to different subjects. This semester I was given the opportunity to incorporate geography in literature. I participate in the CELL program at the Newburgh Armory. A partner and I find a children's literature book that is taken place in another country or has people traveling to another country or state in the United States. The book is read to the students and they are asked comprehension questions as we go along. The students learn three tier two vocabulary words from the book through a big word challenge activity. After, the students title and draw an important scene in their passport to represent the story. We all travel to the location by finding it and pinning it on a map. This experience has given me a passion for connecting literature to social studies.

Dr. Smirnova has provided my classmates and I with wonderful internet resources for teaching economics to young children. As I explored, I loved KidsEconPosters! This website has a literature connection tab that allows the teacher to pick a category of economics that he or she wants to focus on with the students. For example, two of the choices are opportunity cost and interdependence. The more topics provided, the more literature connection's can be made. The students understand concepts better through stories that they can relate to rather than definitions, worksheets, or textbook reading. Underneath is the selection of a Lexile measure. This is excellent for teachers to be able to find books that are at the appropriate reading level of most students. If the students are doing independent reading and some students are having trouble with a specific topic, the teacher can provide an economics book to the student based on his or her specific reading level. A general search can also be done and the concepts covered in the book will be given along with a summary of the story. The numerous books gives the teacher the opportunity to to relate economics to literature multiple times, especially if the students are engaged in this learning process. Overtime, the teacher will gain more and more of these books.

This is just the beginning of the website! The teacher is provided with ten comprehension questions to ask the students based on the economics topic(s) being covered. It is important to check for understanding on the specific ideas being covered to make sure the students are learning the material as planned. If not, the teacher can vary her instruction by maybe explaining and emphasizing the concept more throughout the reading. For every economics concept covered in the book, poster ideas are provided for each. A poster consists of an overview of the economic topic and then ideas and standards are given to do with the students. For example, one economic concept covered in the book A New Coat for Anna is consumers. An overview is written about what consumers face involving limited incomes. For this concept, ideas are given for the teacher for understanding, applying, creating, and evaluating. The activities incorporate writing, art, math, communication skills and higher-level thinking. At the bottom are related lessons that can be used by teachers as well. I find this website extremely beneficial to teachers as they educate students on different economic concepts. The website provides countless children's literature and engaging activities for the students to work through.

What is economics? Economics is a science that deals with making, distributing, selling, and purchasing goods and services. There are many different categories of concepts to teach economics. The categories are fundamental concepts, macroeconomics, microeconomics, international economics, and broad social goals. Each category covers multiple ideas and teaching these ideas to students will allow them to grow on their knowledge and understanding of economics as a whole.

Below is a table displaying all of the concepts that should be taught to elementary students under each category.

Most of these concepts can be taught through student exploration and experiences in the classroom. Economic concepts are present in the real-world, so why not display real-world situations to the students. Under fundamental concepts, I have learned about an engaging activity to teach the concept of scarcity. The teacher is to have a lot of popcorn already popped for the students in the front of the classroom. The students are each given several brown paper bags. The first row or group of students is asked to come take as much popcorn as they want. The teacher continues to call on the other rows or groups until all of the popcorn in the bag is gone. The students ask the teacher to open the other grocery bag and the teacher acts in shock. He/she tells the students that he/she thought all of the bags were filled with popcorn, this one was filled with crumbled newspaper. This is where a discussion begins to take place about how the students would have taken less if they knew there would not be enough for everyone. Ask the students what the problem is, why this problem exists, and what could be done to fix the situation. Tell the students that this popcorn activity symbolizes a problem in society called scarcity. Explain how people have to make choices and decisions. The teacher can discuss an example of scarcity through natural resources. The students are to come up with the natural resources in the discussion. Having students take notes on the definition of scarcity, along with other concepts, will not help the students understand this idea in the future. This will be something the students memorize for a quiz or test. Instead, the students will remember how they were scare of food in the classroom and what types of decisions they had to make to fix the situation.

For microeconomics concepts, educating students on the idea of supply and demand can be done through an auction related activity. The teacher will allow the students to pick tokens from a box that are different colors. After the students have chosen tokens, the teacher will assign value to them. The teacher will show the students an item that they would love to have in their possession. The lesson plan I found has the teacher announcing that the only way to receive an "A" at the end of the lesson is to own the item. Instead, I would say to the students that the only way they can get extra credit on their social studies homework is if they receive the object. The teacher is to tell the students that he/she only has one of it. He/she will start a bid at 10 and have the students use their tokens to purchase the item. The auction will continue until no other student will pay a higher price and the student who bid the highest will receive the item. Next, the teacher is to bring out a large supply of the same object and tell the students that you have more than you thought. This bid is to start at 1. The important part here is to watch the students and see their reactions. The idea of supply and demand is to be discussed. Why was everyone motivated to pay such a high price for one item? Would the student who got the first item have bid such a high price knowing there was an abundant amount of it? As the teacher explains how the two work, I think this graph is an excellent visual to display. It is simple, but shows the students what was both demonstrated through the activity and is being explained now.

When the idea of supply and demand is understood, the teacher can have the students create their own shopping center by picking out three items and creating prices for each. The students will walk around and "shop" at other students' desks to see what kind of prices they are using. The students are to reflect on how they might change their prices based on classmates with the same item or what the price of an object should be if they are the only one with it. This lesson provides whole-class interaction as well as individual creation to understand an economic concept.

My favorite lesson is teaching exchange rates from the concept of international economics. This instruction is inquiry based by having the students discover information, analyze information, and come to conclusions. The teacher is provide students with coins from the United States. The students are to observe the coins with magnified glasses and then the teacher is to give the students coins from two more countries to examine as well. The students are to compare the surface, symbols, images, letters, and numbers of the coins. As the students observe, the teacher is to explain the relationship between a country's currency to another country's currency. The lesson plan says it perfectly, "If a country has a strong economy, the money it makes is worth more in relation to the currency of a country with a weak economy. The comparative value of any two currencies is rarely one to one." The students are to do research on their own on the three different coins they are observing. Then, the analysis of data occurs with other students. The students are comparing to see what countries have similar money values. The students discuss in order to make decisions. Next, the students are creating a chart on poster board of the exchange rate for the different coins based on the country's money over one week. To incorporate geography, the students can draw illustrations of the three coins researched. The teacher will have a blown up map printed and placed on the board. The students will cut out their coins and place them with pins on the country that the currency belongs to. Below is an example of what the map would look like with just one student's coins on the map. This connects to when I incorporate geography into literature except instead of pinning the setting of a book, the currency are being pinned. The students make their own discoveries, which allows them to understand the concept of an exchange rate through exploration and not lecture.

     ~ Christine Brown