The analysis, of the latest survey on financial literacy carried out by the OECD, found that level of knowledge of the Italian adult population is lower than the average of the countries involved in the survey.
In addition the growing tensions in the economic macro-sphere arising first from Covid 19 pandemic emergency and then from the outbreak of the Russian-Ukrainian conflict. Both highlighted how necessary it is to have a basic knowledge of economic and financial concepts, in order to build and live a more peaceful future life.
Description
The students of the IV and V class of the technical tourism course, on the occasion of the Global Money Week, held from 21 to 27 March 2022, participated in several online meetings organized by Global Shapers of the Naples Hub, with industry experts and financial educator for the in-depth study of topics concerning:
- the operation of the economic machine
- Inflation and money: concepts of real and nominal value
- the simple and compound interest rate
- the personal budget
- the types of income
Global Money Week,GMW,is the annual event promoted by the OECD. The aim is of raising awareness among young people,from preschool age on the importance of acquiring the knowledge, skills and behaviors necessary to make financial decisions consistent with their own needs and possibilities.
http://www.quellocheconta.gov.it/it/news-eventi/global_money_week/
The disciplines involved are economics, mathematics, Italian, and law.
Teachers: Sabrina Nappi, Mario Di Fonza, Lucia Cozzolino, Imperatrice Natale, Krizia Rosa Aiese
Financial Educator: Felice Oliviero, in collaboration with: Giovanni Ciriello
Career Sheet: financial educator
The goal was the dissemination of the economic-financial culture among students, teachers, families, and sector experts, taking into account the guidelines of the Ministry:
http://www.quellocheconta.gov.it/it/chi-siamo/linee_guida/index.html
https://www.globalshapers.org/hubs/naples-hub
Financial Educator, in collaboration with teachers, involved students on the topic of financial education.
Through a simple and fun approach, with videos, interactive quizzes to check the mastery of the contents, the experts, in collaboration with the teacher, involved students in the topic of financial education, in order to explain to them how to manage their budget, learn how to use it responsibly as a useful resource to support future life choices.
Picture provided by the author (Attribution CC-By)
Through a quiz on mentimeter.com, the students wrote what they imagined in their future: starting their own business; buying a car; renting an apartment; studying outside the city; going on holiday
Basic concepts were thus introduced, starting from the functioning of the economy and, arriving at concepts of personal finance.
The experts, starting from basic concepts of microeconomics, such as the alternation of economic cycles and inflationary phenomena, use some examples relating to the effects of what happened on the global economy first as a result of the Covid 19 pandemic, then with the outbreak of war in Ukraine.
Financial educator explained how shocks were generated in the world supply chain, following the Covid 19 pandemic,and how expansionary fiscal, and monetary policies together,with the demand shock on global markets, led to inflation phenomena, then amplified by the outbreak of the Russian- Ukrainian conflict.
The concept of credit / debit is explained by the distinction between “good debts” and “write-downs”.
The students reflected on the costs and benefits of their choices when they buy a product, such as the latest generation smartphone, or a training course, and how these decisions affect not only their well-being but the economy in general.
The economic choices we make every day, knowingly or unknowingly, are fundamental skills.
Targets
- Collect the connection between the disciplines: of mathematics, Italian, and economics, to activate cognitive processes and develop fundamental skills for the economic citizenship of the youngest.
- Promote responsible choices in the use of money. These choices, must be linked to the implementation of environmentally friendly behaviors, in an equally responsible way.
- Sensitize students to adopt a critical, and active style concerning the social and economic dynamics in which they are daily involved.
- Saving education in the context of Citizenship Education
The project was part of the curricular learning units.
https://www.isiseuropa.edu.it/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/2UDA-MATEMATICA-V-TURISTICO.pdf
https://www.isiseuropa.edu.it/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/1UDA-AREA-INDIRIZZO-V-TURISTICO.pdf
Activities: laws and savings
By reading/rereading some articles of the Italian Constitution, (article 1, article 9, article 32, article 34, article 41, article 47), students reflected on the fact that the choices they make today as “savers ”Determine their future.
Focus questions
- Why is it important to save? Who saves? What do we save? What do we waste?
Assets: savings shares
Students, based on their personal experiences, brought examples of savings or waste actions, of managing their weekly pocket money, and report in groups on the social and economic aspects of savings in a concrete and daily case.
Example:
- buying a more efficient refrigerator: cost/benefit
- buy a more fashionable smartphone: Cost/benefit
- buy a training course: Cost/benefit
Activity: data analysis
- Reading of household expenses: bills, invoices, receipts
- Analysis of Operations Research on the problems of choosing between two or more alternatives with the processing of the profitability graph.
https://www.servizioelettriconazionale.it/
Disciplinary contents
- income, personal budget, family, fixed expenses, variable, occasional, attributed value, real, waste, costs -benefit analysis, savings.
Picture provided by the author (Attribution CC-By)
As individuals, the students reflected that saving translates into investments and benefits for both themselves and the community.
In the future as workers / entrepreneurs / investors / and that there is no easy money.
Focus questions
Why do you save?
What are the savings goals?
The concept of savings was studied in depth with behaviors to be associated with the term “savings”.
Turning off the light or taking a shower instead of taking a bath, for example.
The students thought about a concrete example of savings in various daily areas close to them in their preferred expressive mode, commenting on the value.
For example, someone said that even a purchase like a decoder for the TV, not particularly expensive, was possible because the necessary money had been saved.
The experts focused about precautionary savings, which help us in the event of unforeseen and unpredictable events, and they about savings to carry out a project, such as a vacation or a larger house.
They highlighted how the financial objectives are intertwined with those of environmental protection. For example, thanks to sustainable behaviors such as forms of sharing economy or shared purchases not only people protect the environment but can have significant savings.
Focus questions were asked to bring out the perception that students have of the management of the money,they have at their disposal, setting up the dialogue so as not to bring out differences in economic availability.can protect our environment with sustainable behaviors: forms of sharing economy or shared purchases, and we will have significant savings.
For example: what criteria do we use to decide if an expense is possible?
How do we choose the most important expense, if we have to do more than one?
What does budget balance mean?
Students provided examples of inalienable and deferrable expenses.
After having discovered the meaning of the term “budget” together, the attention of the students was focused on managing their budget.
They asked themselves:
What expenses do you consider important? fixed, variable, or occasional expenses?
Is shopping a fixed weekly shopping appointment? Do you usually travel by car or public transport?
Students were aware of their economic choices starting from the budget, a fundamental tool that helps to control income, expenses, and savings, to evaluate the costs/benefits of what is done in the present,and what is planned for the future.
- The students To learn to manage daily income and expenses;
- To Correctly evaluate your resources;
- To Learn the value of savings to achieve a long-term personal project.
Group activity
As a group, students filled out a format on how to best manage their income.
investigation phases.
The students:
- define the monthly savings share to be allocated to investments
- monitor the costs incurred during the month
- analyze the nature to understand whether or not they are “necessary” costs and where to act to increase the amount saved.
Constraints
It was taken into account to fix some sensitive figures, in order not to create a discriminating factor.
These data were taken by accessing the national average data www.istat.it.
The pupils in groups of 4 people intervened on the modifiable entries/exits that depend on choices.
Each team identified a typical family made up of 4 people: mother, father, son (18 years), daughter (4 years) who must carry out a purchase project within one year.
Each group prepared a list of expenses to be placed in three categories: fixed, variable, or occasional expenses and, the results were discussed together.
The aim was to
- stimulate attention to equal gender opportunities (salary …)
- empowering to manage the family budget
Final product in work
Students build a glossary of the economic-financial terms encountered and small video bits and/or presentations to share with other students.
https://www.canva.com/design/DAE_kAyv7m8/bHnQDB2Yyh2gyCRBrPV7TA/view?mode=prototype#title-page
Cross-cutting objectives
Self-esteem, creativity, ability to ask oneself and solve problems, choose and make decisions, a spirit of initiative, entrepreneurship, orientation towards results, change, communication skills, and teamwork.
Deepening
Activities: Research on the reasons and consequences of the 2007/2009 financial crisis generated by the absence of proper use of credit, decline in the real estate sector
Crisis of subprime mortgages on the website www. Consob.it for the control and supervision of financial markets.
Conclusions
The concept of the economy,that was proposed to students, is the one that links personal responsibility with social and civil responsibility: calculations and information at the service of the ability to make decisions based on principles of fairness and sustainability.
Based on this, it is essential to convey to students a differentiation between the types of debt that the state produces.
There is a “good” and a “bad” form of debt.
The country, through investments, tax revenues, and acquisitions on an international scale, bridges the gap that is created between GDP and “public debt”.
Without forgetting that debt should not be understood only with the negative connotation of the term the state uses policies that are not designed to avoid debt but to balance it.
In-depth video for reflections on debt:
https: //www.youtube.com/watch?v=rLaBJRSQO4Q
Financial Educators, and teachers were mentors and facilitators of self-learning: they collected experiences and proposed concrete situations contextualized in school and extra-curricular daily life to make students reflect on the theme of conscious savings.
Pupils shared the learning outcomes and benefits obtained from the project through sentences on www. Mentimeter. it
Comments of students
F.F.
The course was very useful for today and tomorrow because it allows you to explore topics that you did not know, such as good and bad debts, because generally when you think of a debt you think of a negative thing. In the beginning, the experts used terms that were too “sectoral”; then the activities were more interactive and everything that the expert explained is clear to me, also because he was very attentive to our answers, our feedback, and offered us continuous food for thought.
In the beginning, the experts used terms that were too “sectoral”; then,the financial educator is very attentive to the answers we students give, providing us with continuous feedback, and new food for thought.
D. S. The course is very useful for my training, because it deals with topics of reality, like the increase in the price of gasoline and bread
S. M. Experts are available and, the use of examples related to everyday life, allows us to better understand the topics covered.
R. R. the mathematics and finance course intrigued me for the various topics covered; I have learned many new topics thanks to the expositions of the experts and their PowerPoint performances, exhaustive and effective answers.
One of the topics that I found very interesting is “good and bad debts”.
It is a theme I did not even know existed.
D’A. R. This year with the school we started a course with two young professionals dealing with economics and commerce. I believe these topics explained engagingly can be very useful tomorrow.
G. G
I thought the topics difficult, then I must admit that by attending the lessons I changed my mind, everything is very simple and also interesting.
The issues are tackled simply with topical ideas, and it is easy, for us students, to interact with examples taken from our daily life.
