Making change

Students will use plastic coins and paper bills to practice making change with a partner.

A lesson plan for grades 2 and 4–5 Mathematics

By Carol Livingston

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Related topics

• Learn more about addition, decimals, hands-on, making change, mathematics, money, and subtraction.

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Learning outcomes

Students will:

• work cooperatively with a partner.
• switch when counting change from ones to fives to tens accurately.
• look at the cost of an item and amount paid and correctly count out the correct change to a partner.

Teacher planning

Time required for lesson

90 minutes

Materials/resources

• Overhead coins and bills
• Plastic coins and paper bills
• Inexpensive items brought from Dollar Tree or Good Will and garage sale items brought from home
• Items cut out of toy catalogs
• Index cards and magic markers
• Recording sheet for practice problems — one copy for each student
• Making change worksheet — one copy for each student

Technology resources

• Overhead
• Overhead calculator and calculators for each student

Pre-activities

Before attempting this lesson students must be able to identify, know the value of, and count the various denominations of coins and small bills. They should also know how to use a calculator.

Activities

1. Before time for this lesson, the teacher must prepare large index cards with the cost and the amount given to pay for each Dollar Tree item she plans to use in the lesson. As you make these up be sure to include some prices that end with the numerals 5 and 0 as well as other numerals. Example: cost: $2.55 / paid:$3.00
2. Attach an index card to each Dollar Tree Toy and display them in your classroom so that they are easily visible to all students.
3. Group the students in pairs. Do not pass out any student materials at this point.
4. Using an overhead, overhead money, and overhead calculator spend the first 30 minutes of class demonstrating how to make change counting from the cost of each item up to the amount paid. Start with coins of the smallest value and work your way up to the largest value. Example: Hold up a YoYo and say, “I bought this YoYo for $1.27. I gave the clerk $1.50. She counted out my change starting from the cost and counting up to $1.50: $1.28, $1.29, $1.30 (three pennies). Continue counting switching to dimes: $1.40, $1.50 ( two dimes). Three pennies and two dimes is twenty-three cents. So my change was $0.23.
5. Do several problems. After you have done a couple, ask the children to count with you as you move along and ask them questions such as: What’s next? What do I need to do now? Are there any other money combinations I can use to make the same amount of change? If so, what are they?
6. As you’re demonstrating, be sure to include some problems in which the cost ends in five and zero so that students can see that no pennies are needed when making change in those two situations.
7. As you finish each problem,show the students how to check with subtraction on the calculator.
8. After you have done several examples; call on a few volunteers, one at a time, to the overhead to do some making change problems.
9. Now, pass out plastic coins, paper bills, recording sheets, items from toy catalogs and calculators to the students who are seated in pairs.
10. Give the directions for the assignment.
11. Partners take turns choosing a catalog item problem and making change to each other. As each student completes a problem he/she must check the problem with a calculator and then record the required information on the recording sheet.
12. The teacher circulates around the room giving assistance when needed. It is very important to check for understanding and give lots of opportunities for questions during the instructional part of the lesson.
13. Several days of practice may be needed for children to master this skill.

Assessment

Have the students complete the “Making Change” worksheet, in which they solve several making-change problems, record the amount of change, and list the coins and bills needed for each one. They may use the plastic coins and paper bills but no calculators.

Supplemental information

Comments

This activity needs to be on-going over a period of time. Some suggestions that I would make are the following.

1. In a newsletter to parents ask them to provide opportunities for their child to practice making change.
2. As children arrive in the mornings; give them one or two making change problems.
3. Tell the children in the beginning that when they master this skill, they get to have one of the Dollar Tree toys to keep. This may be an incentive for them to try a little harder.

Children enjoy learning the more difficult skills when manipulatives are used to make it easier and fun. Even though we live in a world full of technology, I feel that making change is a skill that we still need to teach.