Dollars & Decisions Interactive Course: Get the Teacher Guide

Have you heard about Dollars & Decisions? It’s a free “Choose Your Own Adventure”–style interactive course designed to introduce basic financial literacy to students in grades 8-12. Before you have your students play it, you’re going to want to check out our Dollars & Decisions Teacher Guide. We’ll show you how to set your class up for success and get the most out of this awesome course. 

What’s the interactive course all about?

Dollars and Decisions Game

The idea behind Dollars & Decisions is to educate students about basic personal finance in critical areas (bank accounts, saving for immediate needs and for the future, and how to manage credit) to give them the knowledge and confidence to manage their money.

The course is set up to reflect a young adult’s life. Players share an apartment with two roommates, choose a job, and have to budget for rent, utilities, and other expenses, based

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Reddit Teachers Share Their Annoying Grade Conversations

The last week before a break feels refreshingly festive, even at the secondary level. Despite the drudgery of exams, there’s still a buzzing excitement in the air as the last day approaches. Trips, parties, naps, treats—they’re all within reach.

And then … you get brought back down to earth with the parade of students begging for a grade change at the last minute.

Now, I think I speak for most teachers when I say we’re willing to forgive a lot. The past couple of years have been really tough on all of us. We understand if you had a few rough weeks back in October (who among us didn’t?). We empathize with the feeling of overwhelm when you realize work is piling up. Teachers don’t expect perfection: We just expect you to try.

Which is why it can feel like our generosity gets taken advantage of with requests

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Check Out These Virtual “Museum in a Box” Collections

For those of us lucky enough to live near museums, the ability to check out museum kits or “to go” boxes is a huge perk. But not everyone has a local museum. (And let’s be honest, the pandemic threw a wrench in getting physical boxes even for teachers who do.) Enter the virtual museum in a box. These Expert Sets from The Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation are carefully curated sets of artifacts for particular topics, and we’ve gone ahead and pulled our favorites aligned to your social studies curriculum. Check it out!

Community Helpers

Photo of mail delivery in 1925

Calling all K-2 teachers! We know you have a unit all about people who have jobs that help the community, like firefighters, nurses, teachers, and farmers. In the Frontline Workers: An Historic Appreciation Expert Set, you’ll find historical pictures of grocery store workers, mail carriers, doctors, and more to share with your students.

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These TikTok Teachers Nail the Week Before Winter Break

Holiday parties with 17 different forms of sugar. Every concert, performance, and program known to man. Candy canes sharpened into stabby weapons.

That’s right, y’all. It’s the week before winter break.

This week can feel like a roller coaster whipping teachers between feeling festive and celebratory one minute and utterly exhausted the next. These TikTok teachers have boiled down all the competing emotions and various stressors of this time of year and packaged them into perfect little clips for us. What a gift!

This pre-K teacher and the week-before-break conversations with littles

@mrwilliamsprek

Only one day left before winter break, fellow teachers! We got this! We can do it! #teachersoftiktok #teacherlife #teacher #teacherhumor #winterbreak

♬ Jingle Bell Rock – Bobby Helms

I haven’t taught pre-K before, but Mr. Williams made me feel like I had. And I need a nap just from watching.

This teacher who somehow channeled every

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Help! A Student Lied About Me and Now Their Parents Are Furious

Dear WeAreTeachers,
One of my second grade students told their mom that I tore up their homework in front of the class. Not only did nothing remotely close to this happen, but I haven’t given them any homework in almost a month. The parent emailed me demanding a conference. What am I supposed to say to this parent if they want to meet about an “issue” that’s a bold-faced lie?  —Professor to a Perjurer

Dear P.T.A.P.,

Gasp! How dare you suggest that children LIE? ?

First, I’m sorry you’re having to deal with this. Had the parent taken a beat to ask, “Hey, is this true?,” they could have avoided the whole thing.

Make sure you gently communicate to the parents before the meeting that the incident didn’t actually happen. It may make the parents tuck their tails and apologize or it might offend them further, but it’s better for

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