For Teachers

Money Activities & Games for 3rd Graders

Here are fun and educational money activities and games you can play with your 3rd grade students.

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As a teacher or homeschooler of 3rd-grade students, you get to see these young learners grow and blossom right before your eyes. Their money education is critical at this age, and teachers can open up avenues for students’ future success every day. Our 3rd-grade money lesson plans page has all the lesson plans you need to cover the most vital money topics, so be sure to head over there for your core materials. Whether you cover banking, accounts, deposits and withdrawals, interest, incentives, consumers and producers, employment and specialization, or division of labor, you can find what you need to download there.

Sometimes, though, you want to let loose with your 3rd-graders and give them a little fun while still sneaking in instructional reinforcement. You can do all this with money games, online activities, and worksheets you create or download for a quick, easy, and practical exposure to money topics. Check out this list of curated activities to keep your kids on the path to financial happiness.

Online Games

You can find a wide variety of games and online activities tailored to the 3rd-grade level online. Some sites charge a fee, while others offer free or limited versions, so be sure to find the right approach for your teaching needs. Here are some of the better offerings.

Add Money

This interactive online game lets students click the answers to straightforward addition problems involving money. They are given realistic products and prices and need to add up the total cost of multiple items; with a multiple-choice format, kids will not stress too much, and it’s a great way to practice addition.

Money Addition Word Problems

For a more challenging activity, kids can play games involving lengthier descriptions of financial situations that require them to add. These activities are fantastic learning tools because they combine money facts and reading comprehension, exposing students to real-world problems they will face when they are older, like grocery store scenarios or sharing costs with others.

Subtract Money

Money comes and goes, and kids can figure out how costs change when you introduce different variables involving subtraction, like in this game. Many of these problems ask students to start with a set amount of cash, calculate how much a few products would cost, and subtract that total from their starting pot. 

Subtracting Money Word Problems

In this exercise, students click through various word problems involving the subtraction of money, providing practice opportunities in a quick and efficient layout. They see examples from grocery stores or online retailers where they need to subtract different amounts of money to find the proper solution.

Multiply Money

3rd-graders are just starting to learn multiplication, but the more hands-on and realistic situations, the easier it is to grasp. These online games make multiplying fun and practical by using money as the theme for its equations, where students total cash amounts and compute various problems.

Money Multiplication Word Problems

This activity targets money problems kids will face in stores: for example, how much will three toothpaste tubes cost if they are $3.00 each? These problems encourage students to think creatively and logically to solve the answers, with an attractive game interface and uncluttered screens to navigate.

Divide Money

While division is challenging for many 3rd-graders, using money makes it a bit easier. Kids click the correct answer from a choice of four solutions, with money consistently in the equations, making this activity a compelling and exciting exercise.

Money Division Word Problems

Dividing money can feel detached from reality for some students, but word problems can bring the numbers to life. Students face problems with cash information, such as how many dollars out of a given amount would three students split and solve using division. 

Hands-On Activities

Your 3rd-graders will thrive with hands-on money activities as you combine multiple instructional strategies to help them grasp key concepts. These exercises are guaranteed to keep your learners engaged and interested in more money knowledge.

Make a Bank

Teachers can establish part of the room to be the “bank.” Kids work through role-play, deciding who is the customer and who is the banker, and the bank provides different services to its clients.  You can give out play money and add to their knowledge about banking and accounts, helping to solidify the core instruction you taught.

Coin Comparisons

Educators can quickly create a triple Venn diagram for this activity, supplying coins of different values to kids. Students separate and move coins to various regions of the sheet based on color, texture, and size, and they learn the differences between currencies. 

Deposits and Withdrawals

In this hands-on activity, students each have piles of cash and are in charge of maintaining their balances through deposits and withdrawals. This exercise can be part of a more extensive project like the class bank or class store, where kids receive money for tasks (that they can deposit) and spend cash on products (for which they would need to take withdrawals).

Riddle Me This: Coin Counting

For this game, teachers create several cards with riddles about money, which they hand out to pairs of students. The teams need to solve the mysteries and use piles of money to total the corresponding amount from the problem, making it an interactive and practical activity to learn about money.

Race to a Dollar

In second grade, students should understand coin values and how to total them to fifty cents, while in third grade, they expand this knowledge and go for higher numbers. You can set up this game by putting several coins of different denominations in a bag, having students make different combinations to reach precisely one dollar in a designated time frame.

Currency Design Games

This game is a proven approach to work with your 3rd-graders, as they design their own bills and coins as if they were minting cash themselves. They can get creative and make various denominations and values with symbols and pictures, but need to explain how much spending power their money has and use it in practice.

Tic-Tac-Toe

Many kids love playing tic-tac-toe, and by substituting money into the game, you can reinforce familiarity with different coins. There are ways to customize the activity, such as having students work with decimal points and come up with unique problems to solve on their game boards.

Interest Activity

Students learn that interest is an extra consideration to factor into costs when they purchase products. You can display several toys in the classroom and let students choose the one they want to buy, telling them each has a specific interest rate. Have them calculate how much extra they would spend on the toy after determining interest.

Persuasion and Incentives Activity

Your 3rd-grade learners examine advertising and incentives, and this activity is an excellent way to reinforce this concept. You can have them create posters of their favorite candy, game, or toy, advertising the game, why people should buy it, and which incentives they will include encouraging consumers to purchase it.

Consumers and Producers Activity

This hands-on assignment is excellent for showing the difference between consumers and producers, allowing kids to connect to their life experiences. They fill out a Venn diagram listing the companies, or producers, they know (with teacher guidance as needed) and then the different products consumers regularly buy, linking the two concepts.

Career Search

Although your students are still young, they may have an idea of the various careers out there and what they might want to do for a living when they are older. You can set up a career research station in the classroom, with books, magazines, and ready-to-play videos, so students can learn which careers interest them and what the job entails. 

Assembly Line Activity

Students line up as if they are working on an assembly line together to create a finished product for this activity. Your kids each have a job or contribution to help the product along, and you can choose various objects to complete to show how teamwork and division of labor works. 

Skip Counting Nickels, Dimes, and Quarters

Teachers can develop straightforward worksheets for this activity, allowing students to work on their skip counting skills with coins. You can give them nickels, dimes, and quarters, which they arrange on the sheet and total by skip counting in the appropriate increments. You can also customize this game to reach the exact total with different coin combinations. 

Class Store

The idea of the class store works in many different grade levels, and 3rd-grade is no exception, providing kids a chance to see how money works in reality and learn about exchanges. Your learners can earn play money for tasks like cleaning up the room, finishing classwork, or doing well on a test, and they can spend it on products like toys, candy, and gadgets. You can reinforce the many topics you have been covering this year, showing them how the ideas they learned connect to real-life situations.

About the Author

Peter Brown

Peter Brown is a National Board Certified teacher with over two decades of experience in the classroom. He loves working with students of all ages in many subjects, but particularly in practical areas like money education, to help kids achieve their goals. When he is not teaching or writing about financial literacy, you can find him surfing, hiking, skiing, or traveling to new places.

Last updated on: September 4, 2023