Interestingly, students requested that I teach about coupons and techniques to help save money when food shopping.  I happily obliged by putting together some engaging activities and resources to help students get started, but then flipped and put them in the driver’s seat to investigate and come up with solutions to their own request.  See below for more details and if you have any interesting ways to teach this topic please share in the comment section below.

Set

• I kicked off this lesson by having students play “The Price is Right” food version…my students love this game!  Students had to guess the cost of each of the products in the presentation and then total up the amount it would cost for all of the items.  Students had fun sharing their totals as they ranged from super low to super high and a lot in between.  *Note:  The prices may vary depending on store and location, but reflect the cost on the actual day of collection.
• Actual prices were then revealed and students wrote them down, totaled the amount for all items and then calculated the difference between the guesstimate totals and the actual total.  The person with the least difference was deemed the “winner”.

Materials

• Projector & Screen
• Laptops or iPads
• Calculators

Activities

• Next, we moved on to unit prices.  For some reason my students struggled with this concept.  So I showed them how to use websites like wikiHow to Calculate and Compare Unit Prices at the Store before we completed the next phase of the activity.
• To calculate the unit prices of the items used in the Price is Right, students were allowed to use their calculators.  However, for learning support students or those who really struggle with math,  this website was helpful and they could just plug in the information.
• After going over the correct unit price answers, we moved on to coupons.  We discussed what they were, how they worked and some Apps they could utilize (some food, some not), using this resource: How to Make Using Coupons Fast and Easy. There are a variety of simple ways to use coupons.This  guide is to show utilizes technology to help make it part of your shopping routine including a list of the best and easiest-to-use apps,making a this resource to help anyone incorporate couponing into their life.
• I provided students with a “shopping list” of the items used in The Price is Right game and students had to calculate the total bill for all items.  We then went over scenarios, discussing how the consumer can best utilize their coupon savings just by choosing the stores that will give them the most “bang” for their coupon.  I explained how some stores only give you the coupon’s face value, while others double up to $1.00 and some stores, in some areas, even double up to $2.00.  Each scenario showed them how their savings changed.
• This is where I turned the request back on my students.  I asked them to research ways to save money on food in the following categories:  #1:  Before buying food:  What are some pre-shopping suggestions that can help save money before ever entering the store? (Include 2)  #2:  How about at the store, while shopping?  What can a consumer do to help lower costs? (Include 3-4)  #3:  What can a consumer change about their eating habits to help reduce food costs? (Include 1-2: You many not use “not eating” or “eating less” as an answer.)  Students must use at least 3 different sources and create a one page, creatively titled, newsletter (templates available in Google Docs) sharing their best 10 suggestions as they applied to the above categories. See guide sheet below for specific details.
• After the newsletter is created, students share with the class examples from each of the categories so they had more money saving ideas to add to their lists.
• To make sure my students were paying attention, I assigned them a Quizziz Game that I made titled “Save or Waste” and told them it would be graded so they needed to do their best.  I assigned it as “homework” on Google Classroom so students could individually complete the quiz, while still competing against their classmates.  However, students completed this in class, not as “homework”. The beauty of Quizziz is that it will grade the quiz for you and put it in a spread sheet so you can see how each student did with each question when finished.

Attachments

• The Price is Right Game (PPT)
• The Price is Right Form (PDF)
• Coupon Case Study Key (PDF)
• Stretching the Food Dollars (PDF)

Resources

• wikiHow to Calculate and Compare Unit Prices at the Store
• Price Per Unit Calculator
• How to Make Using Coupons Fast and Easy
• Quizizz

Image courtesy of Ambro at Free Digital Photos