The Lorax: How Many Ways Can We Make 15 cents?

I have decided that on Friday, my kinders and I will be celebrating Earth Day with a "birthday party" of sorts for Mother Earth.  After reading The Lorax in the morning, we will be doing some Lorax math in the afternoon. 

We have been learning about money in math, so on Friday, we are going to practice different ways of making 15 cents (the price you'll pay if you want to speak with the Once-ler!).  After making 15 cents using real money, I'm going to have my students make (and decorate) the Once-ler's pail and glue paper coins to show how they made 15 cents.  It will look a little something like this:

Then, I'll create a display of the different ways to make 15 cents on the board outside our classroom!  I've put together a kit of the materials needed to give this is a go in your classroom.  It's currently FREE on Teachers Pay Teachers, so please check it out and leave me some feedback (here and/or on Teachers Pay Teachers)!  I'll update with more pictures once my kinder mathematicians have created their pails with 15 cents. 

Caps for Sale!

 In my last post, I mentioned that we had just started our money unit last week.  Near the week's end, we read Caps for Sale. It is one of my favorites! I adore watching my students revisit the story as they read independently and retell the story with such expression (especially when the monkeys imitate the peddler...makes me smile every time!). After reading, we practiced counting sets of dimes.

I asked every child to design a cap to sell. We used dimes to count out 50 cents and then modeled it using paper dimes (using a strip of paper dimes I gave each child).  The printables are available on Teachers Pay Teachers.

    

Who wouldn't spend 50 cents to buy one of these colorful caps?! My kinders were so engaged in the design of their caps! If I were to do this again, I think I would have them make a paper cap to wear. Perhaps we would take photos of the kinder "peddlers" wearing their caps and create a class display in the hallway that reads, "Caps! Caps for sale! Fifty cents a cap!" and display 5 giant dimes below the pictures. I might even make a class book that reads, "(Colton)'s cap costs 50 cents instead of 1 cap costs 50 cents.

A Dollar for Penny

Last week in kindergarten, we started our money unit in math. Every child brought in a bag of coins so that we could practice counting sets of money using real money! We sent home a letter to families specifying the number of each coin to include in the set. I gave families about one week's notice and several lovely families sent in extra bags for children who didn't bring in one of their own. 

The first money book we read was A Dollar for Penny, by Dr. Julie Glass.  The illustrations are lovely and we really enjoyed the simple rhyming text. 

Every child used 5 of their pennies to purchase some lemonade and treats.  Each item was labeled with a price and children had to decide how to spend their 5 cents.  After placing pennies on the items we wanted to purchase, we placed our orders by gluing desired items on a paper mat. 

I gave every child a strip of paper pennies to be used to show 5 cents in pennies.  Finally, we enjoyed a refreshing glass of lemonade.  What a sweet ending to our math lesson!