Stock Tables: Scavenger Hunt

This lesson will show students how to read stock tables. Students will practice researching stock tables in newspapers or on the Internet, then learn how this information applies to actual investments. This lesson plan covers the following subjects:

• Economics: stock tables, stock, investing, earnings
• Mathematics: addition, multiplication, percentages
• Research skills

Procedure

Part I: Journal entry
If you had $1,000 to invest in stock, where would you invest it? Why?

Part II: Class discussion
Discuss students’ journal entries. Which shares did students choose? Why? Discuss:

• Why did you make the choices you did? Was it just because you knew the product or service or because you knew that the company had been profitable, the share had been increasing in price, or there’s been some new, good news about the company? (Use this opportunity to remind the students why those factors are important in choosing shares.)
• How can you calculate how your stock is doing?
• How often would you check in on your stock?
• What would you do if the price seemed to be moving regularly up or steadily down?

Complete the Thought Zone in Stock Swamp as a class. Visit Share River and review how to keep track of your shares. Review the following abbreviations:

• YTD: year to date, or “so far this year”
• % CHG: percent change
• 52-Weeks: past year (Discuss why the tables cover a whole year)
• HIGH: highest price
• LOW: lowest price
• Stock: company name
• CODE: stock code or symbol
• LAST: price at the end of the previous day
• NET CHG: difference between current price and previous price

Discuss why shareholders would want to know this information — and how they use it to make decisions about handling their investments.

• Why is percentage change important?
• Which evidence from the table could suggest that a stock is doing well or not so well?
• What do big changes in price over the last year or the YTD tell investors? Is the change from one day to the next as important? How could you tell if the stock you’re interested in is behaving the way other stocks are or if it is behaving differently?

Part III: Individual work
Split the class into groups of 3 or 4. Hand out worksheets and read instructions aloud. Students will practice reading stock tables and locating stock information quickly. Distribute newspapers or have groups search financial websites (such as Yahoo! Finance, Money Café and Money Manager). Students may need further instructions on how to use the search function on these websites.

Part IV: Regroup
Discuss worksheets.

• What strategies did you find worked best for locating stock information quickly?
• Which of the companies students looked up seem to be performing best?
• Which stocks had the weakest record?

Assessment
Worksheet
Class participation

Additional activities
Have students “invest” $1,000 in up to 5 shares of their choosing. Students may sell their shares and buy new ones with the money from the sale. Follow the shares through the next month to see who ends up with a portfolio worth the most. Analyse why that happened. Can you explain why the portfolio with the smallest value ended up that way?

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