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Fourth Grade - Social Studies
Activities
Pioneer Backpacks
Financial and Economic Concepts: Scarcity and Choices
Fourth Grade – Social Studies
Standard 2: Students will understand how Utah's history has been shaped by many diverse people, events, and ideas.
Objective 2: Describe ways that Utah has changed over time.
Time: 45 Minutes
Materials: 2 backpacks, variety of camping/survival items (label with price tag/cost), pioneer artifacts (label with price tag/cost), writing supplies.
This activity helps students understand that sometimes choices have to be made out of necessity. Students are divided into two groups; assign one group as pioneers and the other as modern-day children. Hand out the empty backpacks to each group. Allow students to work as a group to determine what they would pack for their trip, based on scenarios described in the Lesson Details.
Lesson Details (pdf)
Where Does the Money Go?
Financial and Economic Concepts: Saving and Financial Investing Fourth Grade – Social Studies
Standard 2: Students will understand how Utah’s history has been shaped by many diverse people, events, and ideas.
Objective 3: Investigate the development of the economy in Utah.
Math CC 4 MD 2
Use the four operations to solve word problems involving distances, intervals of time, liquid volumes, masses of objects, and money, including problems involving simple fractions or decimals, and problems that require expressing measurements given in a larger unit in terms of a smaller unit. Represent measurement quantities using diagrams such as number line diagrams that feature a measurement scale.
Time: 20 Minutes
Materials: Writing materials
Pretending that they get $10.00 allowance each week, ask students to list on a sheet of paper what they are going to do with their money, including the dollar amounts.
In a class session ask students to describe what they chose to do with the money. On the board categorize the ways students allocated the money.
Some students will probably list savings as a component of using their money. Ask these students what they are saving for. Why?
Demonstrate that in order to obtain future wants, it is usually necessary to save a percentage of the money that we receive. Ask students how this could be accomplished.
Repeat the activity and have students imagine they were early Utah settlers. Have a classroom discussion comparing what money might be used for then, versus what money is used for now. What are some similarities and some differences?
Lemonade for Sale
Financial and Economic Concepts: Entrepreneurism Fourth Grade – Social Studies
Standard 2: Students will understand how Utah's history has been shaped by many diverse people, events, and ideas.
Objective 3: Investigate the development of the economy in Utah.
Lemonade for Sale
by Stuart J. Murphy
ISBN: 0-06-446715-5
Time: 45-50 Minutes (additional time needed if students share their product as a class. To reduce time, present in groups and display in class.)
Materials:
- book, Lemonade for Sale by Stuart J. Murphy,
- Variety of resources easily available in your classroom or schoolyard, such as: construction paper, pipe cleaners, pom-poms, glue, popsicle sticks, glitter, plastic cups, crayons, scissors, flowers, leaves, sticks, yarn, newspapers, small rocks, etc. Enough for each student to produce a product.
- Stapler
- Hole Punch
- Handout 1: Lemonade for Sale Worksheet. Make one copy for each student.
- Handout 2: My Product. Make one copy for each student.
- Handout 3: Assessment.
Using the book, Lemonade for Sale this lesson incorporates the economic concepts of producer, consumer, and productive resources through active exploration. Students listen to a story about children who produce and sell lemonade to raise money for their clubhouse. Then they produce a product and classify the resources used in production as natural resources, capital resources (goods), or human resources. The extension activities integrate mathematics and language arts as students graph the lemonade sales and create an advertisement for lemonade.
Students will be able to:
- Define and give examples of natural, human, and capital resources.
- Determine which productive resources (natural, human, and capital) were used in the construction of a product.
- Describe in pictures and words the concepts of consumers and producers.
- Apply the concepts of consumer and producer to a real life situation.
Complete Lesson Plan (pdf)
Used with Permission: The Federal Reserve Bank of Richmond
