Change-Making Game

Grade: 3 and 4
Subject: Math
Skills: Addition and subtraction with money
Time: 10 minutes preparation time; 45 minutes for activity
Materials: A number cube, small index cards, pencil, and paper

This easy activity requires just a few minutes of preparation time and will give your child with valuable practice adding and subtracting with money. He'll be able to cruise through the supermarket checkout in no time!

Step 1:
Label 5 index cards "$10", label 5 more cards "$5", and 5 additional cards "$1". Shuffle the cards and place them in a pile with all the numbers facing down; this is the "wallet" deck. Now you're ready to play Change-Maker!

Step 2:
Begin by asking your child draw a card from the wallet deck. This card represents the amount of money that your child has in his wallet and can spend on an item at the store.

Step 3:
Next, your child rolls the die three times. On a sheet of paper, he writes the three rolled numbers, in order from left to right, and translates these numbers into a pretend "price" of an item that he's going to buy. For example, if your child rolled 4, 3, and 8, he should write "$4.38" on the sheet of paper.

Step 4:
Finally, your child must figure out if he has enough money to buy the item. If not, he must say "Not enough!" and the next player takes a turn. If your child does have enough money, however, he must figure out how much change would be received from making the purchase. For example, if your child draws a "$10" card and rolls a price of $4.38, he should calculate that the total change after purchasing this item would be $5.62. If your child calculates the change improperly, he must continue taking turns as described above until he either doesn't have enough money to purchase an item or is able to calculate his change correctly.

Step 5:
Continue playing in this fashion, with you drawing a card from the wallet deck, rolling a "price" on the number cube, deciding if you have enough money and, if so, how much change would be received if you bought the item at the "rolled" price. You and your child can take turns this way until all cards in the wallet deck have been used.

For more tips and activities, visit eSCORE.com.

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