Economics classes coming to Cooper Elementary

When students return to Cooper Elementary School on Aug. 18, there will be lots of new things to discover, including two new "specials."

At Cooper, specials are the classes, like art, music and library, that take the students out of their classroom and to a specials teacher. The specials teachers see almost every student in the school, usually on a weekly basis. Two new specials are joining the lineup this year: economics and drama.

Today's kids need a better understanding of money, Principal Matt Young said about the economics class.

"Kids believe a card is magic," he said. They don't see the labor that goes into adding funds to a bank account to cover the debits. The economics class will help them understand that plastic cards are not magic.

Economics are part of the state standards for each level, teacher Stacey Pehosh said. She will be the economics teacher at Cooper.

"When you take economics down to its basic level, even little kids understand," she explained. A kindergarten teacher for 24 years, she knows exactly what her youngest students can understand. At Cooper she'll teach each grade from kindergarten through fourth grade.

"We'll start off with teaching them terms and getting them familiar with the language," she said. Even the teachers will have to become familiar with words like supply and demand, scarcity and abundance. With the older grades, she'll discuss banking processes and entrepreneurship.

Her style of teaching is very project oriented, she explained. She may help students start a craft business with their products for sale at a craft fair. But first, they will have to fill out job applications, create a budget and order the raw materials.

She'll also use literature that can be related to economics. For example, The Little Red Hen uses natural resources.

The older group may read a chapter book about the life of Sam Walton. She'll also use games.

"For the first time in American history we are negative savers," she said, "Not only are we not saving, but most Americans are in debt. We have a generation of people who are used to living on credit."

By starting economic lessons very young, Pehosh believes she can stop that trend.

General News on 07/30/2014