Wednesday, January 13, 2016

Grocery Shopping – Unit Lesson

Here is a lesson for grocery shopping which can be done at different skill levels in Grades 3-5.

Everyone goes grocery shopping as a step towards independence. Students who go grocery shopping need to learn how to check prices and total prices to make sure that they have the right amount of money. It is also important to decide which stores have the better bargains in order to save money.

1. The teacher will get grocery advertisements from the newspaper or online. It would be best to use several different grocery store ads. The teacher will cut out individual food items with prices.
2. Students who need to work on adding skills will choose the number of items as assigned by the teacher. The student will add up the items on paper, show the teacher, and then check their answers using a calculator.
3. Once the students master the addition skills, they will continue to the next procedure.
4. Students who need to work on multiplication skills will choose the number of items as assigned by the teacher. They will roll a die to determine how many of those items would be bought. The students will multiply the price by that number, show the teacher, and then check their answers using a calculator.
5. Once the students master the multiplication skills, they will continue to the next procedure.
6. Students who need to work on division will choose the number of items as assigned by the teacher. Students will figure out the unit price for each item. If the item is available in different grocery stores, the student will decide which store has the best price.

You can download the free lesson plan from HERE. 


Do you teach grocery shopping in your classroom? What activities would you add to this lesson? Please share.

2 comments:

Earth Wactor said...

I love how this activity works for students of various ability levels. As a teacher, is it important to accommodate for all students ranging from struggling to advanced learners. This activity allows all students to be involved while individuals are asked to complete different tasks. I also like that this teaches a life skill as well as computational skills. Another activity that has the same concept would be to give the students magazines of various products for children, and give them an imaginary amount of money to spend. The students would then create a list of things they would buy from the magazine that would remain in their budget. You could have some students subtracting by starting with the amount of money they were given and deducting prices of the items; or have them add by simply adding the dollar amounts of the products without going over the budget. This activity would be simpler to plan than the grocery shopping one because it would involve less preparation (cutting out the items). Same concept and an equally fun activity!

loonyhiker said...

@Earth Wactor Thanks so much for your input and your suggestions! It sounds like it could be another activity for students to practice their money skills in addition to grocery shopping.