Every year Forbes magazine compiles a list of the wealthiest people in America. Bill Gates, Jeff Bezos, and Warren Buffett all appear at the top of the list year after year. So how did these people build wealth? They all started their own businesses and amassed great fortunes by providing a product or service in high demand. While most of us will never achieve this level of wealth, we can all create enough wealth over time to live very comfortably in retirement. Using savvy saving strategies, many of us have the ability to become millionaires. Some guiding questions for this module are:
What are ways I can save money? What services do financial markets offer to savers? How does the money I’m saving grow over time? What types of things should I be saving money for How are financial markets regulated?
Arkansas standards covered in this curriculum:
Arkansas economics standards were revised in 2017 to further incorporate personal financial literacy.
The standards document linked below shows an overview of Arkansas’s economic standards. The highlighted standards are included in the Building Wealth module and can be found on pages 3, 8, 12, & 13.
Full PDF versions of all state social studies standards can be located on the Arkansas Department of Education website.
Curriculum Layout:
At the start of this curriculum, you will see a schedule to guide you through how to explore the included content with your students. Detailed lesson plans give teachers an overview of the materials and include additional images and graphs to assist teachers in providing visual aids. Also included are questions to explore during class discussion, and worksheets and activities to include to assess mastery.
How to access:
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Other materials:
The following materials will provide instructors with additional information and activity suggestions to expand on topics presented in this unit. Some of these materials may require internet access. These materials were created by other organizations that work to create economic education content, and were included in this module for their connections to Arkansas standards.
Building Good Financial Habits
This 38 minute podcast was created by NPR. The strategies included in the companion article come from the book The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg.
Smart money management requires building a foundation in strong, healthy financial habits. In this activity, we’ll learn about how habits work and then apply that knowledge to a financial habit that you’d like to change.
Next Gen Personal Finance is a non-profit organization that works to partner with teachers by sharing timely and relevant curricular resources, providing effective professional development, and advocating to increase access to financial education.
The Stock Market Game™ is a national program of the SIFMA Foundation that allows students and teachers the opportunity to invest a virtual $100,000 in stocks, bonds and mutual funds throughout an engaging 13-week simulation each semester. A year-long session is also available that begins in September and ends in April.
Economics Arkansas has been the facilitator of this program in Arkansas since 1999. Check out their website to see how the game is making such a huge difference in the Arkansas classroom: https://www.economicsarkansas.org/for_teachers/stock_market_game.html