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Putting Students at the Front of the Class
Sarah Heath knows how hard it is to teach financial literacy skills to her students. She also knows that it’s never too early to start learning, and modeling, good financial behaviors. That’s why Heath, a business education teacher at Peachtree Ridge High School in Suwannee, Georgia not only teaches her students using the best curriculum available, she also has her students apply what they have learned to teach others. This year, Ms. Heath’s class developed a one hour lesson plan to teach money basics and to model good and bad financial behavior to a nearby second grade class.
Before heading across the parking lot to the elementary school, Ms. Heath’s students first had to grapple with their own financial literacy education. Using curriculum resources from the award-winning Practical Money Skills for Life website and the National Endowment for Financial Education (http://www.nefe.org), Ms. Heath helped the students understand the importance of personal finance choices and how to set long-term and short-term financial goals.
 The students then designed the second grade lesson plan themselves. They based the introduction on Georgia State and Gwinnett County financial literacy and educational standards. The high school students used their own money to purchase piggy banks, which they then gave to each second grader to use in the lesson. The class used the piggy banks to set up learning games such as “Simon Says” and an allowance game to help with coin identification, counting, and math. The second graders were given the banks to take home and share what they had learned with their parents. To close out their lesson, Ms. Heath’s students stressed the importance of saving with a skit aimed at modeling good and bad saving behaviors.
“My students learned so much by teaching the second graders,” Ms. Heath stated. “They were able to put what we were talking about into action.” The second graders thought Ms. Heath’s class was a hit. With piggy banks in hand, they left school, excited by the day and ready to start saving.
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Sarah Heath 
