Things You'll Need:
- Play money (or real money--coins and $1 bills)
- <br>Small items to "sell"
- <br>Catalogs (online or paper)
- <br>Recipes and the ingredients to follow them
- <br>Kitchen measuring tools like cups, teaspoons, etc.
-
Step 1
Play "store" with your child. Have him select a number of small items, perhaps snacks or toys, then set prices for those things: ten cents for an orange, for example, or a dollar for a matchbox car. Give him some play money or real money to "spend", and have him try to keep track of all of the things he wants to buy and stick within the budget of the sum he has been given. After you've "sold" him the items, you can then set up the game all over again, only this time he gets to be the seller and you are the buyer.
-
Step 2
Gather up some catalogs with items that appeal to your child. If you prefer, you can go on a website instead. Set a pretend budget of something like $100, then have your child go through and add up all of the things she'd like to buy. Have her total the cost of the items, then see what she must subtract in order to get below the $100 limit. This is a good lesson not just in math, but in economics--and it may help her learn why she can't ave absolutely everything she wants, because mom has to stick to a budget too!
-
Step 3
Take your child to the grocery store with you. As you shop, be sure to look at the prices of things and discuss them. Is $2.50 for a dozen eggs a better deal than $3 for 18 eggs? Why or why not? This can be used as another valuable life lesson, too, as the concepts go beyond math. For example, it may be a much better deal to buy 10 pounds of hamburger, but you might not have enough room in your freezer so you'd be better off buying a smaller package. These kinds of lessons are fun for kids as they make them feel grown up. And they will be invaluable later in life when they actually do need to shop on their own and stick to a budget (and limited freezer space).
-
Step 4
Incorporate fractions into snacktime--cut sandwiches or small pizzas into halves, quarters, and so on. You can also count out crackers, grapes, or other small items and then learn about subtraction by having your child eat a certain number of them, then recount them.
-
Step 5
Try some actual cooking with your child. Choose a fairly simple recipe, then get out the ingredients and the measuring tools. Have your child do all of the measuring-- one cup of this, 1/2 teaspoon of that. With an older child, you might look for a recipe you could double, or a large one you could cut in half. This may help him to learn that half of one tablespoon is one and a half teaspoons or that two cups is one pint.
