Helping Students with Financial Literacy

I want to share a helpful resource for teachers that focus on financial literacy.

The Earn Your Future Digital Lab is an interactive curricula designed to empower young minds with financial and economic knowledge.

“Earn Your Future” Digital Lab is a comprehensive financial literacy program designed for students in grades 3-12. Students engage with financial literacy concepts through innovative self-paced modules featuring custom videos, animations, and interactive activities. Educators are supported with embedded student assessment tools with real-time feedback, “Level Handbooks” and “Module Planning & Resource Guides.” The content is impactful, relatable, and aligned with Council for Economic Educators standards.

This resource is free to use and very well put together. I played with it over a few days and actually had some myths about credit and other financial issues cleared up for me.

Every teacher can sign up for free and create classes. Once there, teachers can create student accounts by typing in their name or by uploading a CSV File. Each student will get their own log in and password and this allows the teacher to track the work the student has accomplished.

There are three levels for students to explore. Level 1 is for beginners, level 2 is intermediate, and level 3 is advanced. I decided to jump into the advanced level and really test my knowledge.

I chose the first level and it was about Credit. There was a pretest, two videos, and multiple activities to walk me through how credit woks, what it is, and how certain things can and cannot impact credit scores. Best of all, I was able to do all of this on my iPhone! This is great for classes where students can use their own devices.

The app allows students earn badges as they complete more of the self-paced content. It is a great for students to show that they have accomplished their work and the teacher can see how far the students have come along.

Teachers do not need to feel like they are heading into this in the dark. There are great Educator Guides that can help teachers implement this application into their regular schedule.



The PwCCharitable Foundation has created a great resource for grades 3-12 that helps students learn valuable skills as they move forward in life. Too many kids get hit with credit card debt and face confusion over other aspects of financial literacy, it's great to see something that helps students and teachers get a better understanding of very complex ideas. Currently, there are interactive modules for middle and high school students, with elementary modules coming in the fall.

The PwC Charitable Foundation supports the people of PricewaterhouseCoopers in times of need and invests in emerging solutions to society’s greatest challenges in education and humanitarianism.

To take a look at the modules offered, simply sign up at the app here to view the materials offered to families and teachers: http://app.pwcfdnearnyourfuture.org/

Feel free to run through the lessons yourself and see what you still have to learn about financial literacy.

Student Innovation #TEDEd #MakerEd

Part of being a TED Ed Innovative Educator is working on an Innovation Project. We are able to choose something to work on for the year and document what we have learned. I had a hard time thinking about my project and all of the other TIEs have amazing projects. I had to think long and hard about what I care most about and I decided that student innovation is important to me. I want to create more opportunities for Student Innovation.

The first way I tried to implement Student Innovation Projects is to use 20 Time. I gave one class the chance to work on any project they wanted. It went very well and students created some interesting projects they were passionate about. The one obstacle I faced was trying to find balance in helping too much versus not enough. I felt like some students could have used more support, but then there were times I caught myself helping too much. It feels like such a thin line, but it is something I see I need to continue to work on for future projects. 

One project that came out of this group was a way for students to scan their ID card when they leave the room with s pass and scan when they get back to keep an accurate lot of who is in the room. The scanner is connected to a Raspberry Pi and sends the info to a Google Doc. Our Superintendent saw the student presentation and wants to see this piloted in our schools. The students are currently working on this as an Independent Study with my support. 

I really wanted to give students opportunities for innovation outside of my classroom. It is one of the reasons why I worked hard to create the Makerspace in our library. After becoming a Raspberry Pi Certified Educator, I thought it might be cool to see what students could do if they were given Pi and asked to identify and problem and come up with a solution. After a few weeks, the students blew us away. We had four teams and here is a quick recap of their projects:

Web-based application that will allow a person to turn on/off any device that is plugged into their system. It could be lights in your room or the coffee pot in the kitchen. Just login and turn them on or off.

A wifi based garage door opener that could eventually have a detector  that can notify you when it is opened or closed.

A wifi connected robot rover that can take pics and record video.

The winning project was a Raspberry Pi connected to a touch screen monitor that allowed users to enter in their medication and the times they need to take it. The screen then starts a countdown and will notify users when it is time to take their next but of medication. Future extensions will have text capabilities. This group has another member that worked hard on the code, but she could not be their because she had sailing practice. 

I loved watching all of these students share their projects and what they learned along the way. All of them talked about the failures and frustrations, but also the excitement that followed when they got it working. It was also fun to hear other students ask questions and offer suggestions for the other projects. It was a very nice collaborative atmosphere for the students and it all took place in our Makers Lounge. 

There were two groups that dropped out. They said that they could not get their projects working and did not want to present. Despite encouraging them to come out and share their work, they were no-shows. I wonder how much more support I could have offered those students. More meeting times or something might have helped. Getting feedback will help for next time. 

Overall, I think this was a huge success. This was the first ever STEAM competition our school has held like this and I think it got kids excited to do something different and see what they could learn along the way. It made me so happy to hear that students were teaching themselves how to code and learned so much along the way. You can't make students innovative, but you can give students the opportunity to explore and learn along the way. More often than not, students will create something innovative they never thought was possible. 

The Pi Teams

Winning Team: Noah, Simon and Eva (not pictured)