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The decimal system - coinage (signed)

Description

An introduction to the historical use of shells and beans for buying and selling. Roman and Tudor coins are then introduced before moving on to our present day decimal coinage. The presenter shows each coin and note, and explains how many pennies they are equivalent to and how inconvenient it would be to carry around large numbers of pennies. He finishes by showing a £50 note next to its equivalent of 5,000 pennies.

Classroom Ideas

If each letter of the alphabet had a monetary value with a being 1p, b 2p, c 3p and so on, students could be challenged to calculate the cost of their name. Students could then be asked to pay for this using the smallest number of coins possible.