The best dressed bear (Levels 1 – 2+)
Context for learning
In this activity students make a costume for their teddy bear using resources from a class shop.
Students are given a grant of $20 using New Zealand specimen money and have to purchase
resources to enable them to make a costume. Resources on sale could include: fabric, safety pins,
lace, ribbon, coloured card, feathers, pre-loved toy clothes, pre-loved baby clothes, pipe cleaners,
etc.
The purpose of this activity is to highlight financial thinking and provide students with an
understanding of the key financial messages within this context:
1. We may make different financial decisions from those made by someone else because we
have different preferences or circumstances.
2. Financial planning is important for personal and business financial success.
3. The law guides us to make legitimate financial decisions.
Learning areas
English, The arts, Health & PE, Languages,
Mathematics, Science, Social sciences, Technology
Learning Outcomes
Students will be able to:
1. purchase appropriate resources to make a
costume for their teddy bear
2. keep within budget
3. record their expenditure using a cashbook.
Key competencies
Thinking
 Generating, identifying and assessing
opportunities: thinking about a range of
new financial opportunities and seeing if
they are good ideas.
Participating and contributing
 Planning and organising: setting financial
goals, establishing budgets, establishing a
timeline, making decisions, etc.
 Being flexible and dealing with change:
adapting to unexpected difficulties when
carrying out financial plans and making
new decisions that provide the best
outcomes for you and others.
Financial capability progressions
Money
 Use coins and notes for simple
transactions - give and receive change.
Spending
 Explore spending choices for a given
amount of money and recognise that
peoples’ spending choices differ.
Budgeting and financial management
 Make simple budget choices that
prioritise 'needs' and 'wants'.
Values
Equity
 Recognising the implications of having
more or less money.
Innovation, inquiry, and curiosity
Thinking creatively, critically, and reflectively
to:
 set and achieve personal financial goals
 analyse and solve financial problems
Using language, symbols and texts
 Communicating and receiving ideas and
information: using financial language and
exchanging financial information and ideas
between relevant people.
 Collecting, organising and analysing
information: gathering financial and other
applicable information, and then making
sense of it to support good financial
decision making that stands the test of
time.
Resource requirements
 Teddy bears

New Zealand specimen currency
 Cash book template
 Resources for the shop, eg, fabric, safety pins, lace, ribbon, coloured card, feathers, pre-loved
toy clothes, pre-loved baby clothes, pipe cleaners, etc.
 Specimen currency is available from School Supplies to support Mathematics learning.
Order at: http://www.schoolsupplies.co.nz/
Teaching and learning sequence
1. The teacher announces that they are going to hold a “Best dressed bear competition” in the
classroom and students are invited to bring their favourite teddy bear to school to be dressed
up.
2. The teacher explains to students that they will need to ‘purchase’ resources to make a
costume for their bear from a class shop. The teacher gives all students $20 using New
Zealand specimen currency. The students put their money into an envelope with a cashbook
template glued onto it. They record their opening balance in the correct column of the
cashbook template.
3. The teacher opens the class shop and shows students what is available. Each item has a price
ticket. The students read the prices and a class discussion is held about what items could be
purchased with $20 and what type of clothing could be created. NB: The denominations of
currency that the teacher uses on the price tickets will be determined by students’ number
knowledge – if students are still exploring numbers between 1 and 20 then items are best
priced with whole dollar values; if students are able to recognise that 2 fifty cents make $1 or
that 5 twenty cents make $1 then these lesser valued coins could be used.
4. Students discuss the steps in purchasing goods. The buyers make the offer to buy at a given
price, usually by saying something like “Can I buy this for...?” or ‘I would like to buy this…”
Sellers accept the offer if they agree to the price. A contract is entered into.
5. The teacher and the students draw up some success criteria for the teddy bears’ costumes.
Possible success criteria could include: teddy bear is wearing a hat, top, pants and shoes; the
clothing fits the bear well; the student keeps to budget when purchasing resources, the teddy
bear’s outfit is creative/original, etc.
6. The students draw a plan for their intended costume and list all the resources that they will
need to buy. Students calculate the cost of the resources to check that they will have enough
money. Costume plans are adjusted if necessary.
7. Students purchase the necessary resources from the class shop and make a costume for their
teddy bear. They enter their transactions into their cashbooks.
8. The teddy bears are put on display to be judged. Cashbooks could also be displayed with the
teddy bear to show the transactions that were made to create the costume and the overall
cost of the costume.
9. The teacher judges the teddy bears and gives awards. Possible award categories could
include: “Overall Best Dressed Bear”, “Most Glamorous Bear”, “Cutest Bear”, “Best Hat”,
“Best Shoes”, “Most Economical Costume”, etc.
Reflective questions
1. Students share their expenditure records with their peers and describe how they feel about
their teddy bear costume.
2. Did you have any change left over from your purchases?
3. Did you have to modify your plans to keep within the budget?
4. Did you make the same choices in resource purchasing as other students?
5. Did you take good care of the resources that you purchased or did you waste or ruin some
items?
6. If you could repeat this activity, would you do anything differently?
7. What key financial messages can we write for our display wall?