Setting up your very own class bank complete with money and bank accounts!

The comment below was written by one of my students after I started the CPS Bank in 2003.

In Room 9 at Churchill Park School, we have a bank called the ‘C.P.S Bank’. It is short for the Churchill Park School Bank. We all get wages of $50.00 a week, unless we are absent from class one or more days. If our teacher ‘spot checks’ us and finds our records are not up to date, then the bank charges us penalty interest and this means a withdrawal from our account. If our account record matches the bank’s record, we earn $15.00! It is such a cool idea and I would really like to keep going with it. I really enjoy our bank!”

In 2003, I developed a unique approach to teaching my Year 4 class about money and measurement. This involved having the children design their own notes. My initial idea has been refined over the last two years and has come a very long way since its original inception. I originally devised the guidelines, however the children in my class added their input and consequently the list was revised three times. My class in 2004 further revised the list to suit their own needs. The bank idea – or C.P.S Bank as I call it, is a fully functional working-class bank that children not only learn valuable mathematical and life skills from – they have a lot of fun at the same time. Learning is all about getting excited and this exercise embraces this. There are also strong links with computer applications through doing this unit.

Mathematics

Measurement: Context: The W.S Bank

Core Achievement Objectives

Within a range of meaningful contexts, students should be able to:

• Give change for sums of money

• Represent a sum of money by two or more different combinations of notes and coins

• Perform measuring tasks, using a range of units and scales

Remember your child needs a wallet/purse at school each day!

Your purchase received a link in your email to the CLASS BANK website and password

Plus you will get full access to the Class Bank google drive with all resources listed in order to run your own class bank financial literacy programme.

Comments from my Year 6 students

I think that the bank is good because we can learn about the different types of money in New Zealand.

It will also be good running businesses so that we can learn how to earn more money.

Ashley 

At the start of Term two, Mr L started the E.N.S Bank with Room 18. I think that having the E.N.S Bank is a good idea because learning about banks at our age will prepare us for the future. I also think that the bank is a good idea because it is a interesting topic to study – I really enjoy it and I am learning a lot from this experience.

Oliver 

At the start of Term two, Mr L started the E.N.S Bank with Room 18. I like the bank but I think that the prices are too expensive and it is really complicated. But! There are other ways of earning loads of money. I think that the E.N.S bank is a good way to learn about saving. Thank you Mr L for what you are doing – it helps a lot.

Ruby 

One of the really good things about the G.S Bank is…that I have earned the most money so far out of the girls and if this continues, I might win the HUGE prize

Simone – A Year 4 student at Glenmoor School (Christchurch)