A lesson on supply-and-demand economics turned sweet and crunchy for 145 children at Carrolltowne Elementary School. And they had a ball. A thousand balls, to be precise.
The first-graders and a few second-graders melted 63 pounds of marshmallows, 10 pounds of brown sugar and 12 pounds of butter, all to bind 300 quarts of popcorn into fist-size balls.
The children spent three hours last week in an assembly line with hygienic plastic bags on their hands, forming the mixture into balls to fill orders already taken.
"This is just like a business," said Jamie DiPasquale, 6. "It felt like work more than school."
That means she liked it.
"We went to an economics workshop for all the first-grade teachers in the county," teacher Lorri King said.
"We have had economics in our social studies curriculum, but it's kind of hard to get it down to a level of first grade."
At the workshop, she heard about a school in another state that made and sold popcorn balls as a practical economics lesson.
"Right away, my head started clicking -- 'Popcorn. That's seeds, that's science.' We're always looking for ways to integrate the curriculum instead of looking at subjects in isolation," Ms. King said.
The children studied corn in science, and exercised reading and writing skills with books and reports about farming and food production.
They used math skills to tabulate orders and figure out how much in materials they'd need to make 1,000 popcorn balls.
They also displayed marketing skills by taking orders for some 900 of the balls before the first one had been made. (They ate the other 100.) The price was 25 cents per popcorn ball. The lesson extended to deciding what to do with the more than $200 raised. The students will donate it to Carroll County Food Sunday, the local volunteer-run food bank.
A few weeks ago, the children started by advertising their popcorn-ball project, taking orders and collecting the 25 cents a ball from one another, from parents, grandparents and school employees.
Every student worked on production, but they split into three groups to handle publicity, sales and delivery.
Some real sales talent emerged.
"Kids were getting on the phone to grandparents and saying, 'We're selling popcorn balls. How many do you want?' Not 'Do you want any?' " Ms. King said.
Students themselves bought more than half the balls.
About 20 parents helped with each step of the way, and more parents helped by donating materials and ingredients so that all the money from sales could go to the Food Sunday donation.
On the two production days last week, parents volunteered to pop the corn and make the syrup. The children formed assembly lines to mix, measure and mold.
They learned the importance of keeping the balls the same size, so that customers can be confident they got their 25 cents worth.
"We figured out a way to make all the balls the same size by putting it into a margarine container," Ms. King said. After measuring the amount, the students rolled the mixture into balls.
They put plastic bags on their hands, because commercial food handlers wear gloves or mitts. Parents sprayed the bags with non-stick cooking oil on the outside, so the popcorn-ball mixture would be more manageable.
Michael Beck, a student in teacher Sandy Jones' room, said his favorite part was molding the mixture into balls, sticky mess and all.
"It feels good," he said.
In addition to Ms. King and Ms. Jones, teachers involved in the project were Jeanne Henderson, Paula Ehmann, Carol O'Brien and Karen Bauer.