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The Cost of Debt

Why is it so expensive to borrow money?

Bound stacks of currency

Creative Artifact

Students use Twinery to design an interactive, choose-your-own-adventure game where players face real-world financial decisions as they uncover why it’s so expensive to borrow money and strategize to minimize the total cost of a loan.

Written Commentary

Students design the “back-end” program for their game. When writing this program, students will adjust loan terms, interest rates, and payment options to model how exponential relationships impact the overall cost of a loan.

Exhibition

The games students design are intended to serve as a financial literacy tool and as a result, students will have an opportunity to both play one anothers’ games as well as share their work with others.

Implementation Notes

Credit Eligibility

  • Dollar sign

    Financial Literacy

  • nth root symbol

    Math

Prerequisites Needed

This TLE assumes baseline understanding of linear equations.

Modular Suggestions

A unit within an Algebra 1 course – could be used as an application-based unit alongside a more traditional unit on exponential functions or as a full exponential functions replacement unit.

TLE-Based Semester/Full-Year Course Suggestions

Algebra 1:
X Marks the Spot,
The Hustle Economy,
College Cents,
The Cost of Debt

Personal Finance:
The Hustle Economy,
College Cents,
The Cost of Debt

Standards Addressed

Algebra

  • HSA-SSE.A.1: Interpret expressions that represent a quantity in terms of its context.

Functions

  • HSF-IF.A.2: Use function notation, evaluate functions for inputs in their domains, and interpret statements that use function notation in terms of a context.
  • HSF-IF.C.7: Graph functions expressed symbolically and show key features of the graph, by hand in simple cases and using technology for more complicated cases.
  • HSF-IF.C.8: Write a function defined by an expression in different but equivalent forms to reveal and explain different properties of the function.
  • HSF-BF.1: Write a function that models a relationship between two quantities.
  • HSF-LE.A.1: Distinguish between situations that can be modeled with linear functions and with exponential functions.
  • HSF-LE.A.2: Construct linear and exponential functions, including arithmetic and geometric sequences, given a graph, a description of a relationship, or two input-output pairs.
  • HSF-LE.B.5: Interpret the parameters in a linear or exponential function in terms of a context.
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