Saturday, June 7, 2008

Federal Reserve Bank of New York comics

Somewhere over the years I got hold of some comic books about economics. They have Federal Reserve Bank Of New York written on them so I assume we picked them up in New York, I just don't remember exactly when or where.

They're a good way for kids (or anyone) to learn about how money works in our country. D didn't like the two I had him read but I don't regret making him read them. He complained about studying finance from the beginning; I had hoped these would make it a little better but he's the sort that once he's started, he refuses to change his attitude. Fixing that is probably more important than any academic subject!

Here's the list of the comics we have:
1. The Story of Checks and Electronic Payments
2. The Story of Money
3. Too Much, Too Little (this is about the origins of the Federal Reserve System)
4. The Story of Banks
5. The Story of Inflation
6. The Story of Monetary Policy
7. The Story of Foreign Trade and Exchange (I won't give him this one for a while!)
8. Once Upon A Dime (about going from barter to money)
There's also one called A Penny Saved that I don't have. I just checked the web address on the back of the comics and see that they're still available. It's http://www.ny.frb.org. There's a new one listed too it looks like, only one at a time available. At first I only found the page to order curriculum that can only be sent to a school address so if you homeschool, your school needs a name. BUT in the page search bar, I typed in comics and the choices were accessible from there. The comics are free!
Some of them are simple, elementary kids will learn from them. A couple are more difficult, I'm not bothering to give one of those to D yet. They're a really good learning tool.