1. What is our purpose?

Class/grade:5 Age group:10-11 years

To inquire into the following: School:CMIS School Code: 060195

Transdisciplinary theme:How We Organise Ourselves
Title:Economic activity
An inquiry into the interconnectedness of human-made system and
communities; the structure and function of organizations; societal decision Teacher(s):Pushpita Nandy, Sumita Barua, Subrata Das (Maths) and Jalal Uddin (PYPC)
making; economic activities and their impact on humankind and the
environment. Date : 9th September – 25th October, 2018

Central idea Proposed duration: 48 hours over 6 weeks

Economic activity relies on systems of production, exchange and consumption
of goods and services.
Summative assessment task(s): 2. What do we want to learn?
What are the possible ways of assessing students’ understanding of the What are the key concepts (form, function, causation, change, connection,
central idea? What evidence, including student-initiated actions, will we perspective, and responsibility, reflection) to be emphasized within this
look for? inquiry?
Task: Students will arrange a market day where the whole school (including Key concepts: function, connection, responsibility
parents) will be invited. Students will create their own plan for their stall’s name. Related Concepts: interdependence, inequity, fair, trade
They will select products and services they want to provide to their customers
along with the quantity and quality of those. They will discuss and decide on What lines of inquiry will define the scope of the inquiry into the central idea?
‘who will do what and bring what items’ along with the cost of distribution. They
will decide the price of those products and services and will recheck among 1. The role of supply and demand
themselves so that they do not violate consumer rights and responsibility. They 2. The distribution of goods and services
will be the shopkeeper or the seller of their own stalls. At the end of the market 3. Our responsibility as consumers.
day, they will calculate their profit or loss for the whole event.
Evidence to look: What teacher questions/provocations will drive these inquiries?
Teacher question:
 Planning process of market day.  What is supply?
 Planning for products to be displayed or services to be provided by  What is demand?
understanding the role of demand and supply.  How demand and supply is related?
 Identify the distribution cost of the products or services.  How are we getting our daily products in our nearby shop?
 Plan with respect to consumer rights and responsibility.  How do you act as a consumer?
 How advertisement influence people while purchasing products and services?
Strategy : Performance based Provocation: Students will be told to bring products of their choice to lead the inquiry.
Tool: Rubric.
3. How might we know what we have learned?
This column should be used in conjunction with “How best might
we learn?”
What are the possible ways of assessing students’ prior knowledge
and skills? What evidence will we look for?
Task: Students will be asked to bring products in class. They will try to
identify and discuss materials used, people involved, and place or places of
origin. These discussions will provide the foundation for inquiry.
Evidence: They should come up with the terms like, trade, supply, demand,
consumption, etc.
Students break down the central idea by looking for the meaning of the main
words and rewriting it in a language they understand.
What are the possible ways of assessing student learning in the
context of the lines of inquiry? What evidence will we look for?
 Students will be given a set of questions regarding the role of supply
and demand. Evidence: They should identify the effect of price over
supply and demand on a product. Strategy: Selected Response
Tool: Exemplar
 Students will be given a situation. “Imagine you were a Mayor of our
city. What are some of the goods and services that have been unfairly
distributed in your city? How would you solve the problem of unfair
distribution of goods and services?” Students may choose their way of
presentation among PowerPoint presentation, role play, poster making,
etc. Evidence: They should identify the services that are unfairly
distributed and come up with the solution for those issues. Strategy:
Open ended Tool: Anecdotal notes
 Students will create posters or handouts to communicate to others the
need to know their rights and responsibilities as a service or product
costumer. Evidence: The assessment will be a peer assessment and
will be assessed by the efficacy of these posters in terms of how
informative they will be. Strategy: Process-focused Tool: Checklist
.
4. How best might we learn?
What are the learning experiences suggested by the teacher and/or students to encourage the
students to engage with the inquiries and address the driving questions?
Tuning in (3 days):
 Students will be asked to bring products in class. They will try to identify and discuss materials used,
people involved, and place or places of origin. These discussions will provide the foundation for
inquiry.
 They will list down goods and services which they know. They will mind map and try to break the
central idea for tuning into the theme. They will try to identify primary, secondary and ternary
economic activities. Later they will come up with their own central idea. Students will get to know new
terms like, trade, money, supply, demand, needs and wants, consumption, etc.
 Students make a list of economic activities giving examples for each activity.
Finding out (8 days):
 They will focus on how supply and demand affect trading, and how advertising is used.
 Students will play a trade game named, Coffee Shop. They will play the role of a business man and
try to gain profit by maintain proper supply and demand. From this game they can focus on how
supply and demand affect trading.
 Students will learn line graphs in mathematics integration to help them draw and understand the
demand and supply graphs.
 Children will have an interview session with our school’s stationary department. They will observe the
changes in price and see how they are caused by differences in supply and demand. They will also
connect the experience to their wants and needs.
 Looking at advertising, students will inquire into the elements of an advertisement before applying
their reading skills to compare and contrast different adverts from the same company. To do this they
will make close reading sessions for any company’s adverts. Through this they will be understand
how target audiences are attracted.
Sorting out (6 days)
 Students will differentiate between goods and services.
 Students will be choosing a popular product or service and reflected on its system of production
using a flow diagram.. They will have to identify its production place and where the product gets
distributed. They will also include why the product is traded locally or globally.
 They will get to know about four main distribution channels. Later they will focus on fair and unfair
distribution of goods and services.
Going further (3 days):
 Students will inquire into the rights and responsibilities of a consumer by doing research. They
watched a video on the same. An interview session with an advocate of consumer rights (guest
speaker) will be organized for further research.
 Students will play the Coffee Shop game again to experience profit and loss. They will use their
mathematical skills to work out expenditure and profit margins, Students will experiment with several
prices, to try to find the optimum price that would attract buyers, they will work with unitary method
and also earn them sufficient profit.
Making conclusion and taking action (5 days):
 Students will create posters and handouts to communicate to others the need to know their rights and
responsibilities as a service or product consumer.
 Teachers and students will work together to plan a market day, to which the whole school will be
invited. They will carry out market research to identify possible products and services to make and
sell at the market day.
 What opportunities will occur for transdisciplinary skills development and for
the development of the attributes of the learner profile?
Learner profile:
Knowledgeable: Students will gain knowledge about the economic activities
throughout the unit.
Principled: Students will be responsible as a consumer with the knowledge of
consumer rights.
Skills:
Research skills: Studentwill carry out market research to identify possible products
and services to make and sell at the market day.
Social skills: Students will take responsibility as a consumer.
Communication skills: Students will be able to reflect their research work to the
whole class

Attitudes:
Creativity: Students will be creative while planning for the market day.
Integrity: Students will experiment with several prices, to try to find the optimum price
that would attract buyers and would maintain consumer rights.

5. What resources need to be gathered?

What people, places, audio-visual materials, related literature, music, art, computer software, etc, will be available?

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glossary_of_economics (economics terms), https://www.google.com/search?

ei=QAj9Wv_SL4fYvASO77CACA&q=distribution+of+goods+and+services+&oq=distribution+of+goods+and+services+&gs_l=psy-
ab.3..0l4j0i22i30k1l6.1066165.1067496.0.1068755.13.8.0.0.0.0.134.656.3j3.6.0....0...1c.1.64.psy-ab..8.5.552...33i21k1.0.7jlRlnTS_HU (distribution of goods and
services),https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_eayXd8ZFH8 (demand and supply), https://www.google.com/search?
q=advertisement+of+coca+cola+company&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjQ7-qp_IvbAhUBO48KHQe2DcMQ_AUICigB&biw=1366&bih=613
(advertisements of coca cola company), https://www.google.com/search?
q=rights+of+consumers&source=lnms&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjUqJ_c_IvbAhXMPI8KHQ5UAHwQ_AUICSgA&biw=1366&bih=613&dpr=1 (consumer rights),
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yvTmNHgTJC8 (consumer rights and responsibility),
 http://www.hoodamath.com/games/coffeeshopgame.html (Coffee shop game)
How will the classroom environment, local environment, and/or the community be used to facilitate the inquiry?
 A nearby super shop.
 Guest speaker (advocate of consumer rights)
 Advertisements from newspapers and magazines
Reflecting on the inquiry
6. To what extent did we achieve our purpose?
Assess the outcome of the inquiry by providing evidence of students’
understanding of the central idea. The reflections of all teachers involved in
the planning and teaching of the inquiry should be included.
Homeroom teacher: As the second unit of the year, this unit was a real
challenge for the students. Breaking down the central idea during the tuning in
session and the market day when taking action enabled the students understand
the central idea, “Economic activity relies on systems of production, exchange
and consumption of goods and services”. Students found the meaning of the
main words and tried to come up with a simpler definition of the central idea.
Students learned about how all the pieces of production are important and how
resources are necessary. On the market day the students decided on what they
were going to sell. They had to calculate the cost of production and actually sell
the product. In the end, they learned that the goods they sold got to the
consumers through different channels of distribution.
Mathematics was integrated into the unit when the students calculated the profit
and loss from the “Coffee Shop” game. They also learned how to draw line
graphs and used this knowledge to draw the demand and supply graphs.
English was incorporated when the students wrote a report after having an
interview with the school’s stationary department. They interviewed the school’s
stationary manager who told them more about supply and demand. They later
wrote their reflections in the form of a report.
ART was integrated when the student used old newspapers to make the vase
and other recycled materials to make flowers to sell on the market day.
How you could improve on the assessment task(s) so that you would have
a more accurate picture of each student’s understanding of the central
idea.
Next time, improve the summative assessment task by giving the students a loan
from the school. The students decide on what good to produce, calculate the
production cost then sell the goods to the school community. They should be able
to calculate the profit or loss
What was the evidence that connections were made between the central
idea and the transdisciplinary theme?
The central idea and the transdisciplinary theme (How We Organize Ourselves)
is connected by: economic activities and their impact on humankind and the
environment. To show the connection they planned their market day. They
chose their products to sell, calculated the cost of production, and set a fair price
while keeping the rights and responsibilities of consumers in mind.
© International Baccalaureate Organization 2015
7. To what extent did we include the elements of the PYP?
What were the learning experiences that enabled students to:
Develop an understanding of the concepts identified in “What do we want to learn?”
Function: Our first line of inquiry, “the role of demand and supply” focused on the concept
“function” where students found out how demand and supply work through the coffee shop
game. They drew demand and supply curves to find the equilibrium price. They found out that
supply and demand play an important role in regulating the market price. Where the demand
and supply curves meet the quantity demanded is equal to the quantity supplied. The demand
and supply also tell us about the possible price that will actually exist in the market in a given
time period. The students went to the stationary department to find out more about how supply
and demand works.
Connection: Our second line of inquiry, “the distribution of goods and services” focused on the
concept “connection”. The students found out that once goods and services are produced they
get to the consumer through different channels. They were able to identify four channels of
distribution. The first channel is where goods and services are distributed directly from the
producer to the consumer. In the second channel, goods and services are distributed from the
producer to a wholesaler who in turn sells to a retailer who sells to the consumer.
Responsibility: The third line of inquiry, “Our responsibility as consumers”, focused on the
concept, ”responsibility”. Students watched videos on the rights and responsibilities of consumer
then made a poster and leftlets on the same.
Demonstrate the learning and application of particular transdisciplinary skills?
Research Skills:Students made questionnaires and collected the data of supply and demand
from the stationary department. They recorded their findings in a report and presented to the
class.
Social Skills:They worked cooperatively in a group to make the poster on rights and
responsibilities of a consumer. During the market day they respected each other and their
consumers.
Communication Skills:They listened to their co-mates while presenting projects. They spoke
clearly to their customers on the market day. That day, they had a banner displaying what they
were selling along with the price tags.
Develop particular attributes of the learner profile and/or attitudes?
Learner profile
Principled: Students were principled when they worked for the achievement of the team instead
of the achievement of the individual when playing the “Coffee Shop” game. They reflected the
same when they set a fair price for products keeping the rights of consumers in mind.
Knowledgeable: They acquired in-depth knowledge throughout the unit by gathering
information from the stationary department, watching videos and implementing the market day.
Attitudes
Creativity: They designed their own stalls and created their leaflets for consumer rights and
responsibilities.
Integrity: Students were integral when they were setting fair prices.
Reflecting on the inquiry

8. What student-initiated inquiries arose from the learning? 9. Teacher notes

Record a range of student-initiated inquiries and student questions and highlight  The market day/ charity day was successful. Students and parents
any that were incorporated into the teaching and learning. raised a good amount of money for the sick member of staff.
Student-initiated inquiries  One profile needs to be added – risk taker because one of our students
set his prices high and still managed to sell his product.
1) What is the proper meaning of supply and demand?  The guest speaker – We were not able to contact the advocate. Next
2) What is the role of supply and demand? time we could think of other resource person.
 For the system of production students could visit a factory.
 Meet a marketing specialist to learn more about supply and demand.
At this point teachers should go back to box 2 “What do we want to learn?” and
highlight the teacher questions/provocations that were mosteffective indriving the
inquiries.
What student-initiated actions arose from the learning?
Record student-initiated actions taken by individuals or groups showing their
ability to reflect, to choose and to act.
-Students raised money during their market day summative assessment to help a needy
member of stuff who wasn’t feeling well.
-A students, after learning about their responsibility as consumers, started reading
contents on a product before purchasing. She wants to find out the expiry date and
whether the product has the standard label on it.

© International Baccalaureate Organization 2015