A DAY IN THE MARKET:

A SIMULATION IN UNDERSTANDING AND APPRECIATING BASIC ARITHMETIC

The word mathematics is feared by a lot of people. Just hearing anything related to the
subject can be quite painful to the ears. And all along, since we were required to learn it in school
we never appreciate it as much as any other subject because we dont readily see the relevance in
learning and understanding it. This problem can branch out to many other issues that a 7 year old
child learning basic arithmetic may encounter. Following the principles of Stage VI in Erik
Eriksons Psychosocial Theory the activity below is devised such that simple addition,
subtraction, multiplication, and division can be covered to solve the youths lack of appreciation
in mathematics.
SIMULATION SET-UP
The activity will be a simulation of the actual day-to-day application of mathematics in
the market. The audience will be gathered in a circle as the facilitator will orient the audience of
their mission which is to imagine buying certain food supplies to be able to cook a dish that the
audience is most familiar of. The facilitator will inform the audience of the basic ingredients of
the chosen dish and these ingredients are what they will buy. Each of them will be given 10
tokens to replace the role of money as an exchange value. The facilitator will speak in second
person as he/she tells a situational story of how the audience will spend the tokens. Every time,
the facilitator gives a situation of buying an ingredient the audience will be asked to put a token/s
in front of them as a sign of purchase. The purpose of this is to introduce simple arithmetic.
For example, the audience said that their favorite dish is adobo. One of the ingredients of
adobo is potatoes. The facilitator will assign an arbitrary token value for the ingredient; say 1
token for a potato. However, in example, the dish needs two potatoes then the concept of
multiplication can be introduced. The concept of addition can be introduced by buying two
different items with different values. In this dish it can be a soy sauce and chicken that has token
value of 1 and 3 tokens respectively. Then the audience can be asked to add these values to know
how much in total they will put in front of them. If the audience will be asked how many of a
certain item can they buy with a said value, then division can be introduced. In the end when all
of the ingredients are bought, the audience can be asked how much token they spent. The

facilitator will then asked how much token is left of them and ask the audience if they remember
how much money they initially have. Then the concept of subtraction can be covered. The
simulation should be introduced as interesting so the facilitator is obliged to incorporate an
interesting story that will catch the attention of the 7 year old audiences.
SIMULATION IN RELATION TO THE THEORY
Stage VI of Erik Eriksons theory covers 6-12 years old. He said that the psychosocial
issue most experienced by this age group is what he called Industry vs. Inferiority. Children of
this group start to work hard in the academics to earn achievements. This is because parents
affirm achievements. However, this may bring a feeling of inferiority to the child because the
child may think that he/she is only valuable for his/her achievements alone. This would either
make the child excel in being competitive or not try achieving anything at all.
This is one of the flaws of education system; the numbers in the grading system are
valued with a great deal because it denotes success in later life which is not always true. As the
child is provided information, he/she should also acquire practical skills. To fix this, activities
like practical application, observational analysis, and understanding the flow of a certain system
can be conducted so that the child is not learning a subject to achieve grades but understanding it
simply because he/she it can provide him/her something useful someday.