Sometimes it can be hard to think of real world math activities for kids to learn about and practice math, but teaching them math through couponing is a no-brainer. Bruce, who is six years old, knows that Sunday is a big day in our household because we get five copies of our local paper and we will be cutting out coupons. He also knows that I’ll be checking out my favorite coupon blog: http://couponconnections.com/ for the best deals.
This week, Bruce and Jenna’s favorite toothpaste went on sale at our local grocery store at 2/$6. The coupon inserts included a $1 off one tube coupon. Of course, with five copies of the paper I had five coupons. Score! Normally this same toothpaste sells for $4.50.
We bought five tubes of toothpaste, some with fluoride and some without. (My two year old, Jenna keeps trying to sneak and eat it.)
When we got home we did a mini-lesson on how much money we had saved. Adding, Multiplication, Subtraction, Dividing… our shopping trip with coupons offered a bevy of learning opportunity. If Bruce was a bit older, I could have explained about tax and percents, but I’ll save that for next year!
