Money Teaching Resources

Bring Australian money and financial literacy concepts into your primary school classroom this year with worksheets, games and more resources designed to ensure your students can recognise and count coins and notes, understand the value of different currency denominations and so much more!

This money teacher resources collection is aligned with standards in the Australian maths curriculum, and you'll find everything you need to teach build primary students' understanding of financial transactions and decision-making.

Teaching about money for the very first time? Take a look at this guide from the expert teachers of Teach Starter to help you help your students with this real-world maths concept!

What Is Money? A Kid-Friendly Definition

There's an old saying that money makes the world go round, but what is money really? How do you explain it to your students? Here's a definition of money that we use with our own students!

Money is something that we use to exchange for goods or services.

For example, if you want to buy a new video game, you will need money to pay for it!

What Is a Dollar? A Kid-Friendly Definition

Dollar is another vocabulary word key to teaching students about money.

A dollar is the basic unit of money that Australians use every day.

Some other countries around the world, including the United States and Canada, also base their money system around the dollar.

To represent a dollar, we use a special symbol called the dollar sign, which looks like this: $.

What Is a Cent? A Kid-Friendly Definition

A cent is another unit of money that is used in Australia. It is equal to one hundredth of a dollar.

To represent a cent, we use a special symbol called the cent sign, which looks like this: ¢.

Australian Notes and Coins  — Currency Explained

Currency is a word that we use to describe the form of money that we use to pay for things.

Here in Australia, our currency is made by the Royal Australian Mint and the Reserve Bank of Australia, which are special parts of the Australian government.

Australian currency can be made out of special paper that we call a banknote or note. Currency can also be made out of pieces of metal that we call coins.

These notes and coins each have numbers assigned to them that let us know their value. For example, an Australian dollar is equal to 100 cents.

So, what are the Australian coins and notes that your students should know about? Let's take a look!

Australian Coins

The Royal Australian Mint produces six different Australian coins, all of which we can use to purchase goods or pay for services. These include:

• 5 cent coin
• 10 cent coin
• 20 cent coin
• 50 cent coin
• 1 dollar coin
• 2 dollar coin

Australian Notes

There are currently 5 different Australian notes or banknotes that you may find in your piggybank or at the store.

These notes represent the following denominations:

• $5
• $10
• $20
• $50
• $100