Currency Collections

As a child, I remember whenever we would return from vacation I would spend hours looking at the coins that we had collected. This was pre-Euro in Europe and the coins were fabulous from Drachmas in Greece to Lira from Italy. It would amaze me when we talked in Millions of Lira for something that was a couple of UK pounds. I would then add them to my jar and drive my parents crazy when we came to visit the same country again by having to search through my foreign money jar and find the leftover coins and notes from my trips. I realise I was a lucky and so will my kids be because we have made travel a priority in our family but whether travel and visiting foreign countries is something that you do or not your children can still start a foreign currency collection and it’s a great way to start learning about different countries a little at a time.

Learning Objectives

• Recognise and use symbols for £ and p and combine amounts to make a particular value.
• Can find different combinations of coins that equal the same amount of money.
• Can name a number of countries in the northern hemisphere.

Materials Needed

FREE Printable Currency Collections Sheets
Coins and notes from travels or versions printed from the Internet
Gluestick

Creating your Currency Collections

We have started with two countries and our own that we visited over the summer. I have a few coins left over and I printed out some of the notes as we tend to change back our notes. Then I scanned in our own notes from the UK and coins so we could start with that. Our first collections will be Swiss Franc, US Dollar and the UK Sterling (Pound).

On the sheet’s we titled with the country reminding first that the country would need a capital as it was a Noun.

Then coloured in where on the map the country was in the world.

Once we had that we looked for signs on the coins and on the notes we had about what they were called or if we could recall them wrote that in place.

For the UK and US we looked at the coins and also the notes – the notes were all in the large denominations dollars and pounds, but coins in the UK and US were smaller pence as well as some UK pounds.

The exchange rate was an interesting concept to discuss and we worked out the exchange rate using google asking what is £1 in ….. If you are in the US work out the exchange rate as $1 in …..

On the final sheet, we stuck in the notes and coins as well as labelled them up.

The sheets are now added to a binder that we can add into with more information about the countries, more currency as well as postcards, language work or other bits to support our World Geography Knowledge.

More Currency Activities for the 2nd Grade Blogging Team

Chemical Reactions with Pennies from Creative Family Fun

Money Activities for Second Grade from Look! We’re Learning!

Money Math Problems for 1st-3rd Grade from Planet Smarty Pants

Counting Coins Scavenger Hunt from School Time Snippets

Skip counting nickels and dimes from Sugar Aunts

Currency Collections from Rainy Day Mum

Free Money Fractions and Probability Activity from Life Over C’s