The Gingerbread Man Grades: 1-2, Price: $45

Why not let a gingerbread man take over your class for awhile? What can your students learn from a gingerbread man? How about economics, math, science, written language, social studies and reading!

The Gingerbread Man curriculum unit is an integrated-thematic approach to economic instruction for primary students (late first grade/early second grade). Using "The Gingerbread Man" folktale as a theme, this unit encourages cooperative learning instruction with emphasis on respect, sharing and decision making. Students apply their skills and knowledge as related to that theme. For example, they learn about fractions and apply the skill in baking gingerbread men; they learn how to use coordinates and demonstrate their understanding by tracking the run-away gingerbread men on a map.

The unit contains 15 days of instruction. The activities for each day introduce content and develop higher-order thinking skills as well as social skills. The classroom teacher has the flexibility to use all the lessons as presented in the unit or select a desired section for instruction. Many of the activities can be developed as learning centers.

The Gingerbread Man allows teachers to employ a variety of assessment strategies, such as teacher observation of individual and group participation, evaluation of students' written work and group projects, evaluation of various student performances and student self-evaluation.

This unit is contained in a three-ring binder and includes seven copies of "The Gingerbread Man" folktale for group work.