Financial literacy is a new focus of our redesigned math curriculum in BC. There are content learning standards focused on financial literacy concepts (saving, spending, giving, wanting, needing, budgeting, etc) in grades 1-9. Over the last three years, teachers in Richmond has been investigating ways to learn these concepts with their students. Last year, teachers at Kingwood had financial literacy as a focus of their Innovation Grant project and obtained some great materials to use with their students.

Talk With Our Kids About Money day is a Canadian initiative that is part of financial literacy month is April. It is held on the third Wednesday of April and its goal is to raise awareness of the importance of economic education. This year, two school trustees and Kumi Abercrombie, a representative from the Canadian Foundation for Economic Education visited some of our Richmond classrooms to see what teachers have been doing with their students around financial literacy.

Students in grades 1&2 in Tracy Yuen’s class at Kingwood, engaged in several tasks focused on an awareness of coin values, money and role-playing financial transactions.

Students in grades 3&4 in Leanne Teixera’s class at Garden City shared their “Dragon’s Den” project where they create a product, budget for it its creation, pitch it, etc.

The visiting trustees and Kumi, the representative from the Canadian Foundation for Economic Education with Leanne:

The trustees and Kumi also visited with teachers from the Big Math Ideas for Grades 3-5 after school session at Garden City. Kimi spoke to them about the organization’s goals and we shared the resources on the website which can be found HERE.

We look forward to ongoing collaboration with the CFEE as we examine ways to support teachers and students in this area of the math curriculum.

~Janice