Pennies From Heaven

I was looking through Sophie's homework assignments this evening (she was busy emptying her piggy bank --which I assumed was because she's only $8 away from the Nintendo DSi she wants and she's hoping her savings have multiplied while she was at school) and I came across an assignment requesting that she bring pennies to school.  More specifically, these pennies have be stamped with '1983' or earlier.  Did you know that in '83 the composition of the penny changed from Copper to Zinc?  Who knew?  Did you know if you drop a Copper penny on a hard surface (like formica) it will make a distinctly different sound than a penny comprised of Zinc when it hits the ground?  I'm not entirely certain about this whole penny  business, but Sophie wasn't counting money, she was searching for 'old' pennies to take to school.


Of course, Allie had to get in on it, as well, and she whipped out a Ziploc bag with 16 pennies in it.  She allowed us to inspect their dates, but insisted that they be replaced in the bag and when we were done, she recounted them to make sure we hadn't pocketed one...she's four years old, for cryin' out loud.  I'm just glad she gets the concept of counting to 16!  She thinks 16 pennies is a whole lot of money...not that she's about to share it...but she still thinks she's rolling in dough. 

Imagine the look on her face when Kevin whipped out a shoe box filled with pennies for Sophie to examine.  Allie looked like she'd hit the motherlode.  Those baby blues were gleaming like she'd found buried treasure.  She ooh'ed and aah'ed ran back and forth from the box to her Ziploc bag.  She'd grab a handful of pennies, lay them down and count them one by one.  Then she'd add them to her Ziploc bag while announcing to all of us that she is 'saving for a Dora doll'.   Sophie started to explain the value of a penny but I stopped her.  I didn't want discourage Allie from 'saving', even if it did meaning stealing money from her dad.

I figured, what's the difference between Allie stealing pennies from her dad (who has a bunch of them he isn't using) and socialist governments taking money from the rich and giving to the poor?  If its good enough for Obama, I suppose it must be good enough for my four (almost five) year old.  And hey, if she gets really good at counting all that change, wait till we tell her how many pennies equal our current national debt!  She better get crackin if she wants to count all those pennies!

In any event, after a few minutes of examining pennies, Sophie's hands were black and mine smelled terrible, and she'd  filled her own Ziploc bag with a handful of old pennies when it suddenly occured to me that maybe there's a reason the teacher wants the pennies brought to class in the first place. I Googled 'pennies' and 'coin collecting' and bing-bang-bam!  I had my answer. The old pennies were worth more than the new ones!  Granted, California's public education system is virtually bankrupt, and teachers make about one-tenth of what they deserve so I wondered if the plan might have been for the teacher to swap out those old pennies with nice, shiny new ones.I'm guessing this could be a side-business for Sophie's teach.  Even better, she can get the kids to sort out all of the change for her.  I like her logic.  I love her method...

Dang...I wish I'd thought of it first!