What would you be willing to trade if your family depended on you to get them food, and you were without any money? When approaching this question, I have a hard time answering it. It's hard to imagine your life with such little, when you aren't in that position. Children have such ego-centric minds in many ways, but if forced to answer this question, I'm sure they could. We often underestimate the power of our children, what they consider to be of worth, how they feel about other people and what they hold dear. If we can set the mood in our classrooms so that the kids can know what it "really" feels like to have little to nothing left, an activity like this would be perfect! Have a trade fair. The children can make items, they can bring in old stuff from home (with their parents permission) or they can try to barter with the bare necessities. Set the stage for them with accounts from different settlers that had to give up everything to move on for something. The students can make the rules, establishing what is fair trade and using strategy to get what their family "needs". After the children trade, bring the activity full circle. Ask them why trading like this would be necessary in those times, is there any reason today that people would still have to trade for food, clothes or shelter? Is anybody leaving with absolutely nothing? How would that be prevalent in today's culture?
Questions are the very framework of successful activities in the classroom. They give students a reason to think, and offer opportunity for them to see things through somebody else's eyes. So what is the value of trade? Life, life can be the value of trade.
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