Because of the emphasis on shopping at this time of the year, it gives the teacher the perfect opportunity to focus on money in maths work. Sometimes, I “invest” in a class set of Argos Christmas Gift Guide catalogues to focus on money and budgets. Just get any gift catalogues and try some of these activities with your pupils:

♦ Buy two gifts for your teacher with a budget of €50. What did you buy? How much did they cost? What was the total cost? What was your change?

♦ Give pupils a list of items to find in the catalogue and ask them to work out the total cost.

♦ Buy five items for your Dream Bedroom. There is no budget, after all it is a dream bedroom. What will you buy? How much did they cost? What was the total cost?

♦ Buy a gift for each of the following people in this fictional family: Dad, Mum, Brother aged 8, Sister Aged 2, Granny. You have €150 to spend. Try not to have too much change left over. What did you buy? How much did they cost? What was the total cost? What was your change?

♦ You have €100 to spend on gifts from the catalogue for yourself for Christmas. You must buy 5 items. Try not to have too much change left over. What did you buy? How much did they cost? What was the total cost? What was your change?

These are just suggestions – there’s lots of other work that can be done using a Gift Catalogue from any shop.