If you're a regular listener to Simon Mayo's programme, you'll know that every evening each member of the team prepares a quiz question based on sport, business and financial affairs or general trivia. Today the question posed by Simon himself went along the lines of "In Mexico in Aztec times, cocoa beans were used as currency. If a turkey cost 100 cocoa beans, what could you get for 3 beans? Was it (a) an avocado (b) a wife or (c) a tomato?" The two other members of the team, with much giggling, pleaded for it to be answer b, and were disappointed when it turned out to be answer a.
There I was, washing the pots and pans, thinking "What a neat idea to use when you're teaching numbers in Spanish!"
I've had a little look around the old Internet, and have found out the following info:
The Aztecs were using cocoa beans as currency when the Spaniards first arrived, and continued to do so until as late as 1858. An Aztec document from 1545 gives a list of what you could buy for your beans.
1 small rabbit - 30 beans
1 turkey egg - 3 beans
1 large tomato - 1 bean
1 slave - 100 beans
1 male turkey - 300 beans
1 female turkey - 100 beans
1 newly picked avocado - 3 beans
1 fully ripe avocado - 1 bean
20 small tomatoes - 1 bean
5 long green chili peppers - 1 bean
1 large strip of pine bark for kindling - 5 beans
And finally (maybe not one to share with KS2) the services of 1 prostitute - 10 beans
Cocoa beans were small change. For your bigger purchases you would need mantles (capes or cloaks), copper axe blades or quills of gold dust. 1 cotton cape would set you back 300 beans. A string of jade beans would cost you 600 capes. How many beans is that?
There are lots of possibilities here for some number work in the foreign language using the beans exchange rate. For example:
¿Cuántos granos de cacao para dos conejos?
Tengo veinte granos de cacao. ¿Cuántos huevos de pavo puedo comprar?
There is also plenty of opportunity for intercultural work. How many of the children will know that chocolate, tomatoes, avocados and turkeys come from the Americas? And of course they can find out more about the Aztecs. I've found the Aztecs pages of the Mexicolore site interesting and am going to have another scout around it to see what I can find.
My next-year's-Y3 have already done two years of Spanish with me, and know the numbers 1-15 well. This will give me a good way to revise them without being repetitive.
Getting an international dimension into Numeracy and Maths was already in my mind after someone tweeted a link to this blog post about "McDonald's Menu Items From Around The World" yesterday. You can learn a lot about different countries and cultures from their McDonald's menu, and of course it's something that our students know all about. I've looked at other countries' McDonald's menus before, and my ideas for using the information in schemes of work formed part of a presentation I gave to local headteachers a few years ago. If you would like to have a look at the presentation, you'll find it here.
UPDATE 11.8.11
I've just purchased this book as part of my ever-increasing library of intercultural materials. It refers to the cocoa-bean currency and suggests getting children to draw up their own system of currency using foods, counters or other classroom materials like pens and pencils. They can say, for example, that a red counter is worth 1p or that a pencil is worth €1, and work out how much they would charge in their new currency for groceries, clothes, toys or magazines. There is nothing to stop them doing this work in another language.
I have also created a worksheet for Primary Spanish practising numbers and using cocoa beans, and you can download it here.
What a great idea Claire!
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