HFCA's second-graders heartwarming journey: Exploring economics and the joy of giving
Inquiring minds at Holy Family Catholic Academy (HFCA), Inverness, can lead to amazing results, even when the topic at hand is the study of economics in second grade.
As the only International Baccalaureate World School (IB) in the Northwest suburbs, HFCA uses IB's approaches to teaching and learning to develop critical thinking and problem-solving skills for its more than 500 students.
"The IB framework focuses on transdisciplinary learning, exposing students to a variety of disciplines which leads to a deeper understanding of a subject," explains Principal Kate O'Brien,
Teachers Jodie Speziale and Michelle Wagener used hands-on lessons to teach the role of money, savings, spending, goods and services, and how our economic decisions affect ourselves and others. They challenged the students to earn money by completing jobs at home or in the community. Students then decided how they would like to spend their hard-earned money from walking neighbors' dogs, folding laundry and doing dishes. Overwhelmingly, they voted to use the money for the benefit of others.
The ultimate decision on which charity the students wanted to support was inspired by the real-life experiences of two classmates and an ABC7 News segment. Second-grader Eleanor was talking to her grandfather about this class project. He shared seeing a segment on ABC 7 News about Camden's Comfort Blankets, a local charity dedicated to providing hope and comfort to babies in NICUs at area hospitals. Eleanor and another student, Eva, were recipients of similar blankets when they were newborns, and Eva still has her blanket. Making this real-world connection was very empowering to the second-graders.
This economic lesson culminated with Lauren Humes, president and co-founder of Camden's Comfort Project, meeting with the HFCA students, explaining her charity, and thanking them for their donation. The second-graders worked with their fifth grade buddies and created dozens of blankets, wrote individual letters of encouragement to the families receiving these blankets, and donated money to provide 50 more blankets.
"I was so proud of the HFCA students. The blankets they made were donated to Northwest Community Hospital's NICU in Arlington Heights, which is the same hospital where Eleanor spent some time," said Humes. "The donated blankets were delivered on Nov. 1, my son Camden's birthday."
Katie Bird, HFCA IB coordinator, summarizes the results by saying, "This economics unit is a great example of how teaching complex subjects is best approached experientially. Learning is limitless when we make connections to real-world experiences."
These young students' journey from learning about economics to making a difference in their community brings comfort to infants in NICU and is a heartwarming story that touches all who hear it.