Students ‘exchange’ classroom for real life
Scott Spielman
Editor
It’s always busy at the center of Exchange City, a real-world simulation Wayne students visited on Friday.
It isn’t easy in the real world.
Just ask Nathan Barker. He leaned toward his computer Friday morning, squinting as he adjusted a photo on the front page of the local paper. He leaned back and sighed.
“You really have to work hard,” said the managing editor of the Exchange City Press. “You can’t just sit back and relax.”
That’s a pretty astute observation considering Barker is just a fifth grader. It was a thought echoed by many of his classmates around Exchange City in Taylor, where the news of the day was the class of elementary school students visiting from Taft-Galloway Elementary School in Wayne.
Exchange City is a real-world simulation where the fifth graders are the sole inhabitants of the town. They each have real world jobs; they make up their own laws and run their own stores, banks and—of course—newspapers.
Fifth grade teachers Kelly Kaminski and Nancy Chiasson organized the field trip, which was funded through a $2,100 grant from the Community Foundation of Southeastern Michigan.
“The kids are so excited about this,” said Chiasson. “They’re learning and they’re having fun. That’s the important thing.”
The day-long field trip is actually the culmination of a weeks-long lesson for the students. About 80 of class time goes into the preparation for the day, Kaminski said.
Exchange City consists of a large open room designed like a public town square. Businesses line its edges—there is a broadcast center, a sign shop, a credit union for banking, a city hall, a post office and several shops. The students all apply for their positions, according to Kaminski, which is just one of the lessons they learn throughout the exercise.
“They go through the whole application process,” she said. “They learn about resume writing.”
Some of the shops even sell products, which the students can purchase with the paychecks they earn. There’s a real world lesson in there, too—the first 25 cents of their $2 paycheck goes to the Wellness Center to pay for health insurance.
Throughout the course of the day, the mayor hosts a public hearing where each business has an opportunity to talk about their goods or services. Then the paychecks are printed up and distributed—students have to figure out how much they can spend—they cash them at the credit union (which they can only visit on their lunch hour) before they can visit any of the shops. In the meantime, they have to host staff meetings at their businesses and be careful not to break any of the town rules—then the police officer would cite them and they would have to appear before the judge.
“It’s the culmination of an entire economic curriculum that hits all of the social study grids,” said Kaminski. “It’s a great way to conclude the year. It’s a great, hands-on simulation that helps them learn instead of just reading from textbooks.”
The students vote on their own laws, which are displayed at the edge of the town square. The Taft Galloway students came up with several that mirror classroom no-nos—no chewing gum, no walking on the grass, no fighting, stealing or vandalism—as well as one for the adult chaperones: no smoking.
That’s not the only way the students could get in trouble with the law, though. They also had to run their businesses properly, or face Zack Nichols. He was an ‘environmental agent’ Friday.
“I make sure every shop is running right and if they’re not, I’ll give them a fine,” he said.
At the end of the day, the students take away whatever products they can purchase with their ‘paychecks.’ They get to keep the video that the broadcast center produces, too—and the knowledge of what it’s like out in the real world.
“I learned a lot from it,” said fifth-grader Jessica Enrici. “It’s a very nice field trip. We’ll take a lot home from it.”