Grocery Shopping Game

What You Need:

• Money
• Table
• Several small objects
• Paper
• Construction paper

What You Do:

1. Explain to your child that you will be the grocer and he will be the shopper.
2. Lay out the small objects on the table. Objects can be anything from toys to clothes to food.
3. Have your child help you make little paper tents out of the construction paper. (The simplest tent? Just a regular sheet of paper folded in half.)
4. Write a price on each paper tent. Try to keep prices varied, but only as complicated as you think your child can handle. 
5. Group the items together and place a price tag in front of them. For example, all the 5 cent items should be in one group. All the $1 items are in one group and so on. 
6. Give your child a purse or baggie with some cash. If he has a wallet, this would be a good opportunity to use it. 
7. He can "buy" a number of things from you. But before you accept his money, ask him to tally up how much he owes you. 
8. If he gives you more than he owes, give him back change and ask him to count it. 
9. Continue to let him buy things until he runs out of money. 
10. Now let your child be the grocer. Have him organize the items by price on the table. 
11. Set him up with some coins and a couple of bills so that he can give you change. 
12. Go "buy" a couple items and pay him for them. 
13. If you want to challenge him, give him an incorrect amount of money and see how he handles it. 

After a couple rounds of this grocery game, he will be ready to shop at a real store!