Teaching Economics Using Childrens Literature

• The Giving Tree
• The Doorbell Rang
• A Chair for Mother
• From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil Frankweiler
• Island of the Blue Dolphins.

• Lesson 1: Charlie Needs a Cloak
  Charlie and his favorite sheep produce a good - a new cloak. Students learn about the different productive resources (natural, human, and capital) that Charlie uses. Charlie does not specialize in his production - he does all the production steps himself (unit production).
• Lesson 2: The Giving Tree
  This a tender story about a tree and a boy. The tree loves the boy so much that it is willing to give the boy everything that it has (apples, shade, branches, and trunk). This story represents the ultimate sacrifice of love and the serene acceptance of another's capacity to love in return.
• Lesson 3: The Doorbell Rang
  The Doorbell Rang is a story that emphasizes the spirit of giving. It is an amusing story of two children about to eat a dozen cookies. Each time the children start to eat their cookies, the doorbell rings. Each ring of the doorbell brings more and more children. The cookies have to be redistributed each time. This lesson is an excellent way to introduce the concept of scarcity.
• Lesson 4: Arthur's Pet Business
  To prove he is responsible enough to own a pet and to repay a debt of money to his sister, Aruther decides to start a pet business - providing pet care service to community members. He advertises by putting up signs around the neighborhood. Business is very good. Arthur not only earns a wage (from which he pays his debt), but also gains a pet when one of his "clients" has puppies under his bed.
• Lesson 5: Pancakes, Pancakes!
  This is a story about a boy named Jack who wakes up with an enormous appetite for pancakes. His mother informs him that before she can make pancakes, he must first gather all the necessary ingredients. Jack must cut the wheat, take it to the miller, have the wheat ground, and gather the eggs - a step-by-step process for making pancakes the old fashioned way!
• Lesson 6: The Goat in the Rug
  Geraldine the goal literally puts her whole self into the weaving of a Navajo rug. After being sheared for her wool, she watches as Glenmae cleans, dries, combs, spins, and dyes her wool. Geraldine is so proud. A lot of her is in that rug. She hopes to grow her wool quickly so she can be a part of the next Navajo rug.
• Lesson 7: Mitchell Is Moving
  Mitchell the dinosaur is bored and wants to move away. His decision to move costs him something, something very important left behind. Mitchell solves the dilemma, builds a new home, and keeps an old friend.
• Lesson 8: Uncle Jed's Barbershop
  Uncle Jed's Barbershop is a heartwarming story about a barber who travels the countryside cutting poor folks' hair. Uncle Jed has a kind heart and a giving spirit. He lives for the day that he can own his own barbershop. It takes a long time and many setbacks before his lifelong dream is fulfilled. This wonderful story that emphasizes the true spirit of sacrifice, love, and commitment to a dream.
• Lesson 9: The Little Painter of Sabana Grande
  Fernando loves art and is going to paint for the first time. He learns to make paint from natural resources. Unfortunately, he has no paper! After much persuasion Fernando's parents allow him to paint the outside of their adobe house. Now all his neighbors want houses like the Espino family.
• Lesson 10: Ant Cities
  This is a nonfiction story about different kinds of ants and how they live and work together. Ants live in colonies, and all ants have particular jobs to do, much like workers in our cities. Working together, ants keep their "cities" growing and surviving almost anywhere.
• Lesson 11: Follow an Ice-Cream Cone Around the World
  Travel around the world with the Green$treet kids as they discover what it takes to make ice cream. Through this story, the students will visit the places where the different ingredients (natural resources) in ice cream are found. There are many Billboards in the story that provide interesting facts pertaining to ice cream.
• Lesson 12: The Tortilla Factory
  The Tortilla Factory is a simple, yet enjoyable way to introduce the concept of production to your students. The book very simply explains the process of producing tortillas, from collecting the productive resources to marketing the final product. Students will learn the differences between the natural resources, capital resources, and human resources used in production.
• Lesson 13: A Chair for My Mother
  When all their possessions were burned in a fire, a little girl, her mother, and grandmother save all their extra money to buy a special chair. The characters make choices to save in order to obtain something important to them.
• Lesson 14: All the Money in the World
  Quentin Stowe is an ordinary boy who catches a leprechaun. His wish for all the money in the world is granted, and ends up causing many unexpected problems. As Quentin helps to solve these problems, he learns much about the important economic concept of money.
• Lesson 15: From the Mixed Up Files of Mrs. Basil Frankweiler
  Eleven-year-old Claudia Kincaid feels that too much responsibility has been placed on her at home. To make her family appreciate her more, she decides to run away from home. Claudia persuades her younger brother, Jamie, to accompany her on a trip to a most unlikely place -- the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City.
• Lesson 16: Cally's Enterprise
  Cally's Enterprise features Cally Lippincott and Chuck Foster as the main characters. Cally first meets Chuck while she is at home recuperating from a broken leg. Chuck appears at her door as part of a newspaper selling contest asking people to buy a subscription to the local paper. Chuck is trying to win a trip to Ocean City and wants Cally to become his partner in the contest. He agrees to give Cally half of the profits when they win.
• Lesson 17: Island of the Blue Dolphin
  Karana is an Indian girl stranded alone on an island for 18 years. When the rest of her tribe is forced to flee the island, she learns to use her human resources and the island's natural resources to survive.
• Lesson 18: Kid Power Strikes Back
  Kid Power Strikes Back focuses on a neighborhood business organized by Janie Golden. Janie and her friends decide to expand their Kid Power summer business of grooming lawns, walking dogs, and running errands to shoveling driveways and sidewalks during winter. Throughout the book, Janie and her friends learn valuable lessons in economics. They confront concepts such as open market, monopoly, and, most important, competition.
• Lesson 19: Leave the Cooking to Me
  Leave the Cooking to Me is a humorous, yet touching story of a young girl's responsibility for keeping meals on the table for her single-parent mother and her little sister. Shirley Merton decides to take this daily chore a step further. Without her mother's knowledge. Shirley, a.k.a. Vanessa, opens her own catering business. Her enthusiasm for her new job keeps her from becoming discouraged when she is faced with the many problems and decisions that go along with being an entrepreneur.
• Lesson 20: Beetles Lightly Toasted
  The subject for this year's contest at school is "Conservation." Ten-year-old Andy Moller, who lives on an Iowa farm, and his cousin Jack are both determined to win the $50 prize. The two boys devise hilarious ways to conserve resources -- including eating insects and cooking hamburgers on a car engine.
• Lesson 21: Night of the Twister
  This story, based on a real event, tells how the Hatch family and the people of Grand Island, Nebraska, survive a night of terror when their town is devastated by several tornadoes. Together they not only live through the tragedy but rebuild their lives and the community.