There is no better time to start saving than right now! We have gathered dozens of savings lesson plans together to help your students see exactly how saving and investing will impact their future. All too often young people get started in the “real world” saddled with so much debt that it is hard to grasp what is really going on around them. Avoiding the worst crunches of credit card debt is a great place to start, so give your students a taste of what it means to take out a loan with some of these lessons!

• Click Here for Investing Lesson Plans
• Click Here for other Personal Finance Lesson Plans
• Click Here for Budgeting Lesson Plans
• Click Here for Economics and Taxation Lesson Plans
• Click Here for Math Lesson Plans

Savings Lesson Plans For Elementary School And Up

You Can BANK on This!

• Topic:Credit Card
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt(Standard 1) – Costs and benefits of different types of credit
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mickey Ebert
• Description: Students will assess both negative and positive incentives associated with credit-card use. They will identify profit as an economic incentive for banks to offer credit cards.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Why Money?

• Topic: Payment Methods
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 3) – Describe how to use different payment methods.
• Source: Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank
• Description: In this lesson students look at their purchases, and see the difference between paying with cash, checks, credit cards, or other money instruments
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: The reasons why we use different kinds of money is the same as why we use different kinds of investments. Once your students have a HowTheMarketWorks portfolio, you can talk about the different types of stock, and why different investors might prefer different classes even for the same company.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Savings Lesson Plans For Middle School And Up

Believe it or Not?

• Topic: Advertising
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Saving and Spending (Standard 4) – Apply consumer skills with spending and saving choices
• Source: Econedlink, by Patricia Bonner
• Description: Students will explain the role of advertising from the seller’s point of view,distinguish between fact and opinion in advertisements and view advertisements with a healthy skepticism.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

What’s the Cost of Spending and Saving?

• Topic: Saving
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Sharon Laux
• Description: Students will learn the benefits and opportunity cost of spending and saving. The will students learn how compound interest makes savings grow. They will learn the benefits of saving and investing when you are young.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Climbing the Savings Mountain

• Topic: Saving Money
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 2) – Develop a system for keeping and using financial records.
• Source: EconEdLink,Mickey Ebert
• Description:Students are sometimes clueless when it comes to saving money. It is important that our students learn that saving their money not only helps them achieve financial goals, but actually earns them extra money. In this lesson they will learn that there are a variety of ways in which to save, depending on whether they have short-term or long-term goals.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Banking Basics

• Topic: Savings
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 3) – Describe how to use different payment methods.
• Source: Boston Federal Reserve Bank
• Description: In this scenario, students find that their piggy bank has started to fill up. The lesson plan goes through the decisions of spending the cash, finding a bigger piggy bank, or how they can even open their first savings account, along with the advantages and disadvantages of each scenario.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: All accounts at HowTheMarketWorks earn 3% interest on the cash that has not been invested. Have your students pick stocks they want to buy, but make sure they consider the trade-off of the 3% they can earn with just the cash, or the extra growth they might get by investing in their preferred stocks.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Calculating Simple Interest

• Source: EconEdLink, by Mike Fladlien
• Description: This is a basic introduction to interest and its calculation for students. It covers a few different interest rate levels and time periods.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: We make it interactive! Have your students use our Investment Return Calculator to calculate the growth of savings over time, showing the difference between simple interest and compound interest, and even adjust according to inflation! This is also integrated into our Assignments feature, so your students can answer the quiz at the end and get credit using your Report Card.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Learning About Credit Card Use

• Topic: Credit Cards
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Charlotte Higler
• Description: This lesson is designed to teach students about what exactly credit cards are and how they work, with time spent on their risks and why people use them.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Our Credit Card Payments Calculator is a perfect supplement to this lesson plan, where students can see the debt repayment of up to 4 credit cards! It is interactive, so they can see the differences in interest rates, minimum payments, and starting cash, and it is integrated with our Assignments feature so you can assign the quiz at the end for homework, and track all your students’ progress in their Report Card.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Your Credit Card

• Topic:Credit Card Payments
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mike Fladlien
• Description: This is somewhat similar to the lesson above, but focusing more on picking a credit card based on how long it would take to pay off a hypothetical purchase, given its interest rates and the size of the purchase.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Just like the lesson above, our Credit Card Payments Calculator is great for comparing multiple credit schemes, since it can have up to 4 credit cards with different interest rates calculating at the same time to show how long it would take to pay off a purchase! Since it is integrated into our Assignments, we make it easy to assign as homework.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

The Benefits Of Investing Early

• Topic: Types of Credit
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Julie Trivitt
• Description: This lesson focuses on the benefits of investing early, and how compound interest plays a huge role even with small amounts.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: We have three calculators with this lesson in mind, all of them integrated into our Assignments feature. Our Compound Interest Calculator will show how much interest students would earn with their savings over time, our Investment Return Calculator can show the difference between Simple and Compound Interest, while adjusting for inflation, and our Millionaire Calculator can show students what rates of return they will need to achieve to earn a million dollars with the amount of money they can save every month!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

A Penny Saved

• Topic: Interest growth
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mike Fladlien
• Description: These lesson plans walk students through the basics of interest growth and compounding. The second half goes through more complex topics like Real interest rate, returns on investment, and nominal interest rate, but the first half of the lesson is appropriate for younger students.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Our Compound Interest Calculator is great for the first half of the lesson, where students can see how their savings grows over time, while our Investment Return Calculator is great for the second half, since it can be used to control for inflation to find Real and Nominal interest rates. Since these are both integrated into our Assignments feature, it makes it easy to assign as homework, and follow all your students’ progress in their Report Card!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Credit Cards

• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: Practical Money Skills For Life
• Description: This lesson plan is designed to introduce students to basic credit card terminology, and learn the basics of shopping for a credit card. They will also be given an opportunity to analyze a credit card statement.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Have your students look up several credit card offers and use their advertised rates in our Credit Card Payment Calculator to see how long it takes to pay off!

Access This Lesson Plan: Teacher Resource, Student Activities, Presentation

Savings Lesson Plans For High School And Up

Credit Reports and Credit Scores

• Topic: Credit Reports
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Deb (Standard 2) – Borrower’s rights and responsibilities related to credit reports.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Carrie Hixon
• Description: Using a Better Money Habits video, this lesson explains the differences between credit reports and credit scores.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Earning Credit

• Topic: Credit Score
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Martha Rush
• Description: This project has students work through a series of activities and provide them with a simulated credit score and auto loan interest rate. They can then use interest rates and amortization schedules to see the full cost of buying a car, and compare the difference between someone with a high and low credit score.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: We have a great Car Loan Calculator that your students can use to find the full cost of buying a car, using various interest rates, cash down, and trade-in values. Its also integrated into our Assignments, so you can assign it as homework and track your students’ progress!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Fed Boy And The Catastrophe Clan

• Topic: Credit Card Debt
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: Kansas City Federal Reserve Bank
• Description: This lesson is designed to help students know the biggest pitfalls people fall into with credit card debt, along with the biggest government programs designed for consumer protection with credit.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Give your students a balance they need to pay off, like a new TV or some new furniture, and ask them to split it between credit cards with different interest rates using our Credit Card Payments Calculator. They will get a great interactive experience finding the best way to manage their cards, and with the integrated Assignments, its perfect for homework!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Car Loan Project

• Topic: Payment
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Wendy Clark
• Description: This is a basic exercise examining the process of getting a car loan. Students will look at buying a car using financing, exploring different options for how they will pay for it
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Our Car Loan Calculator has a bunch of different financing options, so you can make this whole lesson interactive!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Loan Amortization – Mortgage

• Topic: Mortgage
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 1) – Analyze the costs and benefits of various types of credit.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mike Fladlien
• Description: This is a lesson plan walking through the basics of what a mortgage is, and how to calculate payments using Excel. This is perhaps the most advanced lesson plan on this list, but one that will give students the most hands-on application of using spreadsheets, interest rate calculation, and more tools that are so vital to a healthy understanding of personal finance.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: You can use our Buy Vs Lease Calculator to get amortization schedules for annual or monthly mortgage payments, and see the break-even points with renting. It updates automatically, and includes tons of different fee types and rental costs!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

The Credit Card Mystery

• Topic: Credit Card
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Credit and Debt (Standard 2) – Summarize a borrower’s rights and responsibilities related to credit reports
• Source: EconEdLink, by Dave Koenig
• Description: This lesson is centered around giving students a better idea of how credit cards work, some of the biggest risks surrounding them (especially for people with multiple cards), and even some of the current government aid programs designed to help consumers manage their credit.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Our Credit Card Payments Calculator allows up to 4 different credit cards, each with different parameters, to see how long it can take to pay off a balance! Its also integrated into our Assignments, making it perfect for homework.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Do you have a great lesson plan you would like to share, or know where we can get more to feature here? Contact our Support Team and let us know!

Budgeting is perhaps the most essential skill a person can have as they begin living on their own. Whether it is the simple act of balancing a check book, managing bank accounts, or deciding whether it is time to buy or rent, building a budget is the basic core of personal finance. Browse this collection of lesson plans, and find great ways to incorporate HowTheMarketWorks!

• Click Here for Investing Lesson Plans
• Click Here for Savings Lesson Plans
• Click Here for other Personal Finance Lesson Plans
• Click Here for Economics and Taxation Lesson Plans
• Click Here for Math Lesson Plans

Budgeting Lesson Plans For Kindergarten

Alexander, Who Used to Be Rich Last Sunday

• Topic: Money
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Saving and Spending (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mary Suiter
• Description: In this lesson students will define saving, spending, opportunity cost, and savings goal. They will learn why it can be hard to save money. They will count to 100 by 2s and recognize that $1 equals 100 cents.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Toys for Me: A Lesson on Choice

• Topic: Scarcity
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Financial Decision Making (Standard 4) – Make criterion-based financial decisions by systematically considering alternatives
• Source: EconEdLink, by Cindy Crain
• Description: Students will learn why they cannot have everything they want because of scarcity, they will describe why scarcity is characterized by “this OR that” and not “this AND that” and define opportunity cost.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

How to save and spend money wisely

• Topic: Money
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Saving and Spending (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving.
• Source: Brainpop Educators
• Description: This lesson plan will help your students learn how to save and spend money wisely. You will be able to empower your students with the skills to be conscious consumers. Help them understand the difference between needs and wants and teach them ways to budget and plan. Practicing financial management skills will help them become more responsible and organized.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Budgeting Lesson Plans For Elementary School And Up

Goods and Services: Some are Private, Some are Not

• Topic: Private Business
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Saving and Spending (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving.
• Source: Econedlink, by EconEdLink Staff Council for Economic Education
• Description: Students will distinguish between goods and services provided by private businesses and those provided by government, explain why governments provide certain goods and services and explain that taxes collected by governments are used to pay for goods and services provided by governments.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

How Much Is that Doggy?

• Topic: Ownership
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Financial Decision Making (Standard 4) – Make criterion-based financial decisions by systematically considering alternatives and consequences.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Kent Steen
• Description: This teaches student about the total cost of ownership, brainstorming the total cost it will take to buy and keep a dog or cat, and decide which is best for them
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Building a budget is important with investing too! Create your contest on HowTheMarketWorks with a small starting cash balance, like $1,000 or $10,000. Next, have your students pick which stocks they want to buy, and determine how much they can afford after subtracting the commission fees. This can be a great way to demonstrate how extra costs can have a big impact, and how buying more of one thing means less of another.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Allowances and Spending Plans

• Topic: Budget
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving.
• Source: Practical Money Skills For Life
• Description: This lesson plan helps students build budgets for their allowance, dividing up their money between things like lunches, video games, movies, savings, clothes, and donations to charity
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Learning to build a budget is a key part of HowTheMarketWorks! Once your students have joined your class contest, have them divide up their starting cash between different companies that they recognize using the Trading Ideas page. There is even a slider built into trading to help them visualize how much of their available cash they are allocating to each company!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Click Here For The Student Activity Sheet For This Lesson Plan

Budgeting Lesson Plans For Middle School And Up

Understanding a Balance Sheet

• Topic: Balance Sheet
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Financial Decision Making (Standard 8) – Use a personal financial plan.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mike Fladlien
• Description: Students will learn the components of a balance sheet by working through many problems to strengthen their understanding.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Budgeting And Income

• Topic: Accounting
• Source: Northwestern Mutual, via TheMint.org
• Description: This is a basic lesson plan to help students understand the differences between fixed and variable costs, different sources of income, and even some basic accounting terminology so they can prepare their own budgets accounting for their living expenses and income
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Try including our Home Budget Calculator in your Assignment for your contest. This will give your students practice in building a workable budget in a variety of scenarios, with breakdowns showing how much they have left for savings and investing after taking expenses into account!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Staying Afloat

• Topic: Budget
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving. 
• Source: EconEdLink, by Michael Koren
• Description: This is very similar to the lesson plan above, but also has students work through several financial scenarios that will cause impacts to their income or wants and needs. They can then discuss how to best accommodate different strains on their budget.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: After using the Budgeting Calculator and building a portfolio on HowTheMarketWorks, have your students re-evaluate their budgeting based on any extra income, or losses, that they have experienced in their portfolio. This can help show that truly workable budgets always require some extra wiggle room for unexpected costs!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

The Art Of Budgeting

• Topic: Saving Plan
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 1) – Develop a plan for spending and saving. 
• Source: Practical Money Skills For Life
• Description: This lesson plan is designed to help students build a step-by-step plan for saving, starting with a fundamental budgeting process. Students will monitor their spending habits in writing, and learn to make realistic savings goals.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Once students have built a basic budget either on paper or by using our Home Budget Calculator, they can take their savings goals to our Millionaire Calculator to see how much their savings can grow over time. This can help show how even a bit of savings every month can really add up! Since it is all integrated into our Assignments feature, you can assign this exercise as homework and track all students’ progress using the Report Card.

Access This Lesson Plan: Teacher Resource, Student Activity, Presentation

The Higher You Climb, The More You Pay

• Topic: Budgeting
• Source: EconEdLink, by Suan Toohey
• Description: This is an exercise in budgeting, exchange rates, and budgeting. Students will need to virtually climb the Eiffel Tower, starting with less than $13 in their pocket, and pay for admission, the telescope at the top, and water along the way (which gets more expensive the higher you go!).
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: There are two great ways to integrate HowTheMarketWorks for this kind of lesson. First, you can have your students build a budget using our Home Budget Calculator, but while your students are buying stocks on HowTheMarketWorks, they will get a very clear feel for how certain stocks will get much more expensive, with lower returns, over time, and timing your budget decisions can be almost as important as the budget itself.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Budgeting Lesson Plans For High School And Up

Using An Excel Checkbook

• Topic: Excel
• Source: EconEdLink, by Mike Fladlien
• Description: This shows students how to build and organize a checkbook, reconciling outstanding payments and deposits
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: Most students will want to blow off reconciling checkbooks, but by using HowTheMarketWorks, you can show how important it can really be. Have students place trades at night, while the markets are closed, and reconcile their cash balances with the purchases they have outstanding. Then when the markets open the next morning and their trades execute, see how close their estimations of their full value were from what they see in the morning.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Banks And Credit Unions

• Topic: Financial Institutions
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 2) – Develop a system for keeping and using financial records.
• Source: EconEdLink, by Melissa Smith
• Description: This lesson plan works to give students a distinction between different financial institutions at a basic level. Your class will work through some of the fundamental differences between two of the most common lenders that people face in their daily lives, and what the differences between them can mean to you.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: To get your students thinking about where they should be saving their money, have them take their HowTheMarketWorks portfolio and put some of their starting cash in mutual funds, some in ETF (Exchange Traded Funds), and hold some just as cash (which works like saving it in a long-term money market account). They can then watch their different investments grow at different rates, with different risk, to see how these similar investment vehicles can have very different outcomes depending on what they are looking for when saving.

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Buying Versus Renting

• Topic: Budgeting
  
• Personal Finance Standard Covered: Spending and Saving (Standard 4) – Apply consumer skills to spending and saving decisions.
• Source: EconEdLink, by John Clow
• Description: Here we have a simple process to use when someone is thinking about moving out on their own, and deciding if investing in their own property is a better long-term decision than renting.
• Using HowTheMarketWorks: We make it interactive! Have your students use our Buy Vs Lease Calculator, and answer the quiz at the end to see the tipping point between buying and renting in different scenarios. You can even track their progress with our built-in Assignments!

Click Here To Access This Lesson Plan

Do you have a great lesson plan you would like to share, or know where we can get more to feature here? Contact our Support Team and let us know!