The following are guidelines for playing the Resource Game*, an activity suitable for middle and upper school grades. The activity allows players to address the challenges of countries trading, buying and selling with the reality of an unequal distribution of resources, wealth, technology, and labor.

It is a good opening activity for thinking about any of the sub-issues of sustainable development and global trade. It is also a good starter for a history unit on the Industrial Revolution. The resources you allocate to any group can be adjusted to emphasis any particular issue.

Materials needed:

Rulers, pencils, white paper, a smaller amount of colored paper, glue sticks, scissors, play currency.

Preparation:

Depending on size of group, create a number of “work stations”, with each station having an unequal number of all of the above resources (except the currency). In addition, do give some currency to one of the work stations, and the color paper to another station.

Divide the group evenly except for the group which has the currency, which should have fewer people in it.

The Game:

The teacher/leader announces that he/she is buying paper chains of five links. Each link must be made of a strip of white paper, 5cm x 20 cm. The current price of the chains is $2.00. Pay each group that $ as they present chains, which the teacher/leader has done “quality checks” on. As students begin to work out production methods, assess resources, seek to trade/buy, etc., the teacher/leader can make note of some of the behaviors displayed. At some point, increase price to $5, decrease to $3, etc. At another point, announce due to market demands, the teacher/leader will pay $7 for colored paper chains, $1 for white, etc. When appropriate, end the game. The group with the most currency wins.

The Debriefing:

Ask some of the following questions:

• Why do you think the winners “won”?
• Was the initial distribution of supplies fair?
• What did each group find most difficult?
• How were difficulties dealt with?
• Did your group have any special work arrangements – were they successful?
• What were the effects of some of the price changes/product specifications?
• Thinking in terms of the global market, what issues came to light
• How would you adjust thee distribution of materials to emphasis an understanding of a particular issue?
• Etc.

The teacher/leader will also want to describe some of the behaviors observed and ask the students to comment on those behaviors.

 Resource Game in PDF -format (36 kb)
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