Introduction

Money isn't just coins and bank notes! Money is anything that is widely accepted to make payments and account for debts and credits. In Canada today, we use coins, bank notes, and electronic funds for these purposes. However, societies throughout history have chosen objects of various shapes and sizes to serve as money. These objects did not look like our currency, but they worked just as well. That's because the most important thing about money is not what it looks like, but rather how readily people accept it as payment. This activity introduces the idea that the things that serve as money usually have a certain number of common characteristics.

Objectives

After completing this activity, students will be able to:

• name some of the common characteristics of items that have served as money.

• get more out of their participation in the educational activity Dig It!, in which they learn why the most important thing about money is not what it looks like, but how readily people accept it as payment.

Activity

1. Using the image of the dentalium, a deepwater shell used as currency by some First Nations peoples, explain to students that societies around the world and through the ages have chosen a variety of objects to serve as money; in other words that money isn't just coins and bank notes. The apparent differences between the dentalium and our own coins and bank notes are misleading. Further analysis will help show why such objects could work perfectly well as money.

2. Ask students what they think are the essential characteristics or qualities of objects that serve as money (focusing the discussion on a description of a particular form of currency, perhaps a familiar object like a coin, might help to get ideas flowing). Make a list as a class. Your list might include the following:

• durable or non-perishable
• difficult to counterfeit
• relatively scarce, but available in adequate amounts
• portable
• divisible (so you can make change with it)
• valuable (note that what is "valuable" varies from society to society)
• readily acceptable by the people who will use it

This last characteristic is perhaps the most important. Before people will use an object as money, they must feel assured that everybody else in their society will accept it as payment at its face value. In Canada, we take that assurance for granted every day.

3. Evaluate our coins and bank notes using your list of characteristics. How do they stack up against your class's list of the qualities of a currency? Next, evaluate the dentalia shells against the list of characteristics you've prepared. How do they compare with our coins and bank notes?

4. Ask students if there are objects in your classroom that might be used as money. Rate them against the list you've drawn up. How do they compare with the forms of currency evaluated so far?

Suggestion

Choose the classroom item that possesses most of the qualities your group listed and make it your class currency for a day. Set up your own microeconomy!