Callie Marksbary Vinton Elementary School Lafayette, Indiana Callie Marksbary, a second grade teacher at Vinton Elementary School, has served as an economic education advocate for the Indiana Council on Economic Education. She has developed economic education curriculum and presented at professional development workshops. Callie's mini-economy unit received the National Presidential Award for Mathematics for the state of Indiana.

Objectives Students learn the three types of productive resources (land, labor, capital) and identify productive resources used to produce goods and services. Students identify how producers use productive resources to produce goods and services. Students define specialization and identify specialized jobs. Students define interdependence and give examples of how people and nations depend on each other for goods and services. Students learn why people trade for goods and services. Students compare daily life in the past and present. Students give examples of our countrys role in world trade. Time Required 5 -6 days Materials Three sheets of butcher paper (approximately 2 feet by 2 feet) with an outline of a drawstring bag on each Magazines and newspapers Glue, scissors, ziplock sandwich baggies, measuring cups Ingredients for trail mix: 1/4 cup of each item per student. Possible ingredients for trail mix include chocolate pieces, nuts, dried apricots, banana chips, oat cereal, wheat cereal, corn cereal, raisins, sunflower seeds. World map Handout 1 — The Trades I Made Handout 2 — Working Toward My Own Definition Handout 3 — The Trail Mix Monster Handout 4 — Label Search

Overview
Elementary students explore and experience the importance of trade and interdependence among countries. Students learn about these important economic concepts, as well as productive resources, specialization, and the assembly line, as they participate in a play and produce their own product in a class project.

Teaching Activities
Day 1
Begin the unit by reading the book Three Ships for Columbus, by Eve Spencer, Steck-Vaughn Co., New York, 1993, or Follow the Dream: The Story of Christopher Columbus, by Peter Sis, The Trumpet Club, New York, 1991. Introduce the concept of trade. Ask students to point out examples of trade from the story. Point out that trade is still used today and give examples. Ask students to complete Handout 1 on trade.

Key questions:

• What is trade?
• Have you ever engaged in trade? For example, have you ever traded a pencil for an eraser or a crayon? Remind students they may have traded services such as desk cleaning for braiding hair.

Day 2
Read and discuss The Tree That Would Not Die, by Ellen Levine, Scholastic, Inc., New York, 1995. In the story, an acorn grows into a tree that lives 400 years. The story is told in first person and chronicles the history of America from the viewpoint of the oak tree.

Ask students if they can find examples of trade in the story. Introduce and define the concepts of productive resources, natural resources, human resources, and capital resources. Ask students to point out examples of these concepts in the story. Do not forget to look at the illustrations.

Draw the outline of a drawstring bag on three large sheets of butcher paper. Give each of the three "bags" a label: Natural Resources, Human Resources, and Capital Resources. Instruct students to go through magazines and newspapers to find examples of these productive resources. They should clip out the examples and glue them on the appropriate bag.

Key Questions:

• What natural resources might have been available to early settlers when they came to America?
• What human resources?
• What capital resources?
• If the settlers did not readily find the resources needed for production of a particular good or service, how might they have obtained them?

Day 3
Read and discuss Make Mine Ice Cream, by Melvin Berger, Newbridge Educational Publishing, New York, 1993, or From Peanuts to Peanut Butter, by Melvin Berger, Newbridge Educational Publishing, New York, 1992. Ask students to give examples of productive resources. Introduce and define specialization, assembly line, and interdependence. Ask students to point out examples of these concepts in the story. Prepare three copies of Handout 2 for each student. Instruct students to complete each handout, using one term per sheet.

Distribute Handout 3, The Trail Mix Monster, to the class. Explain to students they are going to participate in a play. No rehearsals will be necessary, since they will read their parts. Read through the handout as a class and explain the setting of the play. Explain that the objective is for the main character, Lot O. Goodies, to get the coconut he/she needs to make a special trail mix. Next assign the roles. Position characters around the edge of the classroom. Assign remaining students to play the part of sea monsters in the center of the room.

In the activity, Lot first goes to the country that produces coconuts and offers the last bag of trail mix for coconuts. Lot discovers he/she cannot make a clean trade; therefore, Lot must go from country to country until a trade is made. On the way back, Lot stops by each state and completes his/her trades. In order to have Lot sail great distances to make trades, place countries in opposite parts of the room.

Students not assigned a speaking role will play the hungry sea monsters. Every time Lot sails, the sea monsters should make monster noises until he/she reaches land safely. When Lot finally gets the coconut to make the trail mix, the sea monsters should be silent because they have been fed!

Key Questions:

• What did Lot do to get coconut?
• Why did Lot have to go to so many places?
• Why was Lot successful on the second round of trading but not on the first?
• How did the trades help all the characters?
• How do we (or people in history) use trading? What are the advantages? What are the disadvantages or problems?
• What have we done to make trading easier for everyone?

Extended Activity

Instead of using The Trail Mix Monster, give each student a unique recipe for trail mix. Each recipe has five ingredients, some of which are common and therefore easily obtained by trade, while others are relatively rare. Each student should also hold five to 10 cards with trail mix ingredients printed on them. Students should trade for cards to complete their unique recipes. Each recipe can be completed with available cards; however, depending on the trades made, not everyone will be able to make his or her recipe. Use this alternate activity to get students thinking about scarcity and the benefits of trade. The activity can also lead into a discussion on the development of money or currency.

Key Questions:

• What was the sequence of trades?
• What goods and services were being traded?
• Why were the trades necessary?
• What would make the trades easier? (currency or money)

Day 4
Read and discuss A River Ran Wild, by Lynne Cherry, Harcourt Brace & Co., New York, 1992. The story reviews the history of the Nashua River from the time the Native Americans named it to today. Review the concept of specialization. Countries produce those goods and services that they can produce cheaply and trade for the goods and services they do not produce. Explain to the class they will now specialize in a particular job, and will depend on other workers (human resources) for completing their work and attaining a high level of quality. Set up an assembly line using the stations described below for the production of trail mix. Assign two students per station. Place baggies, measuring cups, and trail mix items down the center of one or two long tables. Ask students to stand on opposite sides of a table. Instruct students to select six items.

• Station 1: Take baggie out of box.
• Station 2: Place 1/4 cup chocolate pieces into baggie.
• Station 3: Place 1/4 cup nuts into baggie.
• Station 4: Place 1/4 cup raisins into baggie.
• Station 5: Place 1/4 cup dried apricots into baggie.
• Station 6: Place 1/4 cup banana chips into baggie.
• Station 7: Place 1/4 cup sunflower seeds into baggie.
• Station 8: Place 1/4 cup oat cereal into baggie.
• Station 9: Place 1/4 cup wheat cereal into baggie.
• Station 10: Place 1/4 cup corn cereal into baggie.
• Station 11: Zip baggie closed and gently shake.

The ingredients and number of stations can be adjusted according to class size and allergies to foods. Eat and enjoy!

Key Questions:

• Why do companies and workers specialize?
• Why must people/companies/countries be interdependent?
• What did you learn when you participated in the assembly line?
• What made the assembly line work smoothly?
• Did anything make the assembly line stop working or bog down? What? Why?
• How can you make the assembly line better?

Extended Activity

Using Make Mine Ice Cream or From Peanuts to Peanut Butter, set up an assembly line to make your own ice cream or your own peanut butter.

Day 5
Point out how trade among countries is necessary for people to get the goods and services they need. Explain that countries today are still interdependent — relying on trade with other countries for goods and services. Next introduce students to the label search in Handout 4. During sharing time, students should locate and place a pushpin in the country where the good was produced. Ask students why certain goods were produced in that particular country. Discuss their responses.

Key Questions:

• Were there clusters of pins in areas of the world?
• Why do you think so many goods were produced in those areas of the world?
• What productive resources are probably readily available for the production of these goods?

Extended Activity

Using appropriate reference books or the Internet, students should research countries to find out what goods and services they produce, export, and import. Students should also find the natural resources that are prevalent in a country and place representations of these resources on a map.

Economic Concepts Trade — Voluntary exchange of goods and services. Productive resources — All inputs used in the production of goods and services. Natural resources — Inputs into production that are provided by nature, such as land, rivers, and mineral deposits. Human resources — A skilled and educated workforce. Capital resources — Manufactured goods used to make and market other goods and services. Specialization — The concentration of one’s efforts as related to the division of labor. Interdependence — A supportive relationship between two or more people, organizations, or societies. A link between decisions and events in one part of the world or in one sector of an economy to other parts of the world or other sectors of the economy.