What is Ohlone Trading Day?

We got this idea from Asa and Lauren's 3rd grade teacher Mrs. Pedersen.

Throughout the year, the students would earn rocks or little pebbles for diffferent things, such as: good behavior, doing well on 3 minute tests, etc. By the end of the school year each student would have earned a substantial amount of "rocks/pebbles."

At the end of the year which was a few weeks ago the students had what they called "Ohlone Trading Day." Each student brought fun items from home that they wanted to sell/trade for their rocks/pebbles.

I was able to attend this event and it was such a fun and creative idea! I love Mrs. Pedersen, she has such wonderful ideas to involve the kids and to get them to love to learn.

On trading day some students went all out and brought tables, chairs, snack bar which included candy, fruits, junk food, drinks, homemade baked goods, all kinds of toys ... some of them even made posters advertising what they were selling. While I was there I could hear some of these cute little 3rd graders yelling "get your strawberries here," " come buy your mom a mother's day gift here." The students were so into this activity. Many of them bought items for their parents and younger siblings. They learned so much on that day, running their own little stores, bargaining, keeping track of their pebbles/rocks and making sure to give back exact change.They are such business people.

I was so proud of Asa when he said he wanted to save all of his pebbles. LOL! I told him that in this case it would be a good idea to spend most of it, since no other stores accept pebbles or rocks.

Dena and I thought this was such a great idea that we wanted to incorporate this with friends and family for this summer! All is welcome to join! All you need is to get some of those clear pebbles, I'll post a picture. Mrs. Pedersen had 3 different amounts:

$1.00
$10.00
$100.00

The pebbles are fairly cheap. I found a few bags at a yard sale. You can determine which one's are worth what. Mrs. Pedersen had clear pebbles worth $1.00, colord pebbles worth $10.00 and bigger size pebbles were worth $100.00. I think it would be easiest if each household determines the amount for their pebbles ... we'll probably have to label them some how so there's no confusion during "Trading Day."

This summer the kids could earn their pebbles. I am planning on giving pebbles for even a simple task such as saying please and thank you. Some of those kids had up to $1000.00 plus pebbles. I don't know if we have enough time that much but I was just giving you an idea.

I was thinking of a few rules and you are welcome to give your ideas. I came up with this rule because I had to stop myself from doing this when I went to visit Trading Day.

1) very little to no help from parents lol

when I went to visit the kids were doing such a great job ... I went to check out Asa's little blanket of items and I immediately took over ... he even had several customers lined up and I started to take over that too! he even let me and wanted me to ... but I had to remind myself that this was Asa's "thing" his opportunity to learn and not depend on mom. So, that's rule #1 let the kids do all the work and us mom's will sit back and not interfere.

2) location. I think it needs to be somewhere where the kids are not distracted with playground sets or other fun toys. I think that would take away from the Trading. Mrs. Pedersen had the kids in her "Indian Village most of the day. The kids took a break for lunch. I was thinking 2 hours would be good enough time.

Those are the only rules I have so far. Please post a comment if you'd like to add.

post a comment if your in. This blog would be so much fun if we would post little stories throughout our day! Please post and get your pebbles. You could get them from Dollar Tree.

I will post pictures of Mrs. Pedersen's Ohlone Trading Day ...

Thank You,

Tui