We’d like to congratulate Enchanted Hills Elementary School 5th Grade Teacher Marlee Couch on her recent award of a 2021 enrichEd® classroom grant. Ms. Couch was one of only 10 recipients to receive a $1,000 grant. The grant was awarded to assist with her project called “Classroom Economy.”
The “Classroom Economy” project is a year-long behavior program. At the beginning of the year, students set up their own classroom bank account, learned about the importance of saving money and about adult responsibility to pay bills and make good choices. During the project, Ms. Couch also teaches students how to write checks and fill out deposit and withdraw slips. She wants her students to be involved in each aspect of the project so they can take ownership of it and take an active role in its success. To help accomplish this, she created jobs for each student and decided how much they would get paid for performing work in those roles ... $50 a week for those who have jobs and $25 a week for those who don't (those individuals are on “Paid Time Off”). They also earn $100 for turning in homework each week and they can receive bonuses each day for making good choices. In addition, as a class they created a “Fines List” with fines they could receive; for example, a messy desk is a $30 fine, being a distraction in class is a $10 fine, etc. They also have monthly rent that they are responsible to pay to the bank each month. Their rent includes payments for WIFI, desk and chair rental, and for their books. Each Friday, the students receive their paychecks and are allowed to deposit them at the bank, withdraw money to purchase items at the class store, or to save it for the end of year auction. The bank and store are run by two students from Ms. Couch’s class. The enrichEd® grant funds will go towards purchasing items for the project store.
This is such a creative and useful project for our students and we’re so fortunate to have teachers like Ms. Couch working to ignite student potential each day and prepare our students to be productive members of our community.