Title: Lesson 3   "Shall We Eat Out?"  Grade levels: 4th and 5th  Subjects: Health and Mathematics

Students will compare and contrast the cost of cooking verses eating out.
Students will identify prices of items.
Students will calculate taxes.
Students will calculate labor expenses.

Durations of lesson: Three days

Day 1   Three hour field trip
Day 2    60 minute class period
Day 3   45 minute class period

Materials:

• Menus from lesson two
• Thanksgiving shopping list
• Tips for Thanksgiving Dinner on a Budget
• Plymouth Dining Menu
• grocery advertisement inserts
• overhead projector sheets
• overhead projector pens for each group
• calculators

• computer
• overhead projector
• calculators
• Excel

Teacher Notes:

  Permission slips for field trip

Procedures:

Day 1
1.  Review lesson where they prepared their Thanksgiving menus.  Tell them today they will decide which would be more cost effect: eating out or cooking the Thanksgiving meal.
2.  Print "The Shopping List" for each group.
3.  Take a field trip to the grocery store.   Each group needs to find the items and record the price.  If a field trip is not possible see modifications.

 
Day 2
1.  Have students add the total costs of the bill.  Talk about the items that may already be in their homes ( example: flour, salt, et...).  For the purpose of this exercise deduct the cost of those items.
2.  Have the students calculate the tax.
3.  Have the students determine the amount of time they think that it will take to cook this meal.  Using their estimate of time, have students multiply it by the minimum wage to determine the cost of the meal preparation.
4.  Have each group put their computations on an overhead sheet.  Have each group present their computations.

Day 3
1.  Present handouts of "Plymouth  Dining Menu".
2.  Have each group calculate the cost for 10 people ( four adults and six children) to go to dinner there.  They should do each of the three dinner choices.
3.  Compare the price of cooking the meals to dining out.

Modifications:

• If you can not take a field trip to the grocery store, you could use the grocery advertisement inserts.  You could also have each group split the list up, with each child being responsible for finding the price of several items then sharing with the group.
• Have students use calculators to do the computations.

Have the students figure out the cost of a packaged meal.  Many local grocery stores advertise these during the holidays.  Or you can use the Cajun Grocer page

Completion of student computations.
Student presentations

Language Arts  4.10,13,14,15,17,20,31
                    5.2,4,5,6,8,16,27,32
Math  4.17,18,20,21,54
           5.11,14,16,48,50

Life Skills
2. Understands and applies basic principles of logic and reasoning
6. Applies decision-making techniques
Mathematics Standards
 1. Uses a variety of strategies in the problem-solving process
3. Uses basic and advanced procedures while performing the processes of computation
 9. Understands the general nature and uses of mathematics
Language Standards
 7. Uses reading skills and strategies to understand and interpret a variety of informational texts
 8. Uses listening and speaking strategies for different purposes
 9. Uses viewing skills and strategies to understand and interpret visual media

References:

Apples for Health website
Plimoth website
Thanksgiving Shopping List website
Cajun Grocer website
Graphics
More Graphics

Author:

Marcy Bisher
Rebecca Custer
Deborah Hinkle