Striker Jones_Elementary Economics for Elementary Detectives

by Maggie M. Larche

  “Not so fast,” continued Ms. Peters over the growing noise from the students. “We’re not going to get to keep them. Instead we’re going to donate them to the Chorale Pals, our local community chorus. They are going caroling at the local nursing home over the break, and we are going to support them by donating scarves for them to wear while singing.”

  The spark of interest from the students abruptly faded.

  “We have to make scarves, and we don’t even get to keep them?” asked Ralph.

  “Hey,” whispered Sheila to Amy, “Aren’t you in the Chorale Pals?”

  Amy nodded. “I joined it when we first moved here.”

  “Come on, guys,” said Ms. Peters loudly, frowning at the lukewarm response. “Where is your holiday spirit? Now,” she clapped her hands, “supplies are at the front of the class, and I’ve got several different colors of material. You need to cut out your scarf, and then use the other colors to make patterns. You can use the fabric glue I’ve provided to attach your designs.”

  “Come on!” said Sheila, considerably more energized than any other student. She grabbed Amy’s hand and pulled her to the front of the room. They reached the materials before anyone else and began to rummage around.

  Striker watched them from his seat as other students meandered to the materials table.

  “Man,” said Bill beside him. “I’m glad we’re not doing regular work, but I could think of a hundred things to do that would be more fun than making a scarf. Why can’t this morning’s Christmas party just go all day?”

  “Yeah,” said Striker. “But at least we’ve got the party candy to keep us going!” He pulled out his goody bag from the class Christmas party. It was overflowing with sweets.

  Bill stole a chocolate and pointed to the front of the room. Sheila was excitedly comparing gold and red material at the supplies table. “Sheila’s scarf is probably going to be the only good one.”

  Striker looked around at the other students. Sheila did seem to be the only person who was enthusiastic about the project.

  “Hey,” he said to Bill. “Let’s make a little bet.”

  Bill leaned forward and raised his eyebrows.

  Striker continued. “I’m going to go out on a limb and guess that Sheila’s scarf isn’t the best one—but don’t tell her I said that,” he added quickly.

  “Really?” asked Bill. “Ok, then, I’ll bite. Whose do you think it will be?”

  “Amy’s,” said Striker.

  Bill laughed out loud. “Amy?” He glanced to the front of the room where Amy stood with an exasperated look on her face as Sheila held up a swatch of royal blue fabric against her. “Amy doesn’t look like she’s too into the project. You’re on!”

  Striker grinned. “Ok. What are we betting?”

  Bill looked thoughtful. “Hmm… If I win, you give me your candy.”

  “Ok,” said Striker. “But if I win, I get yours.”

  Bill laughed. “Deal.”

  The boys shook hands.

  “Now, stop taking my chocolate,” said Striker. “You’ve got a scarf to make.”

  They left their desks to pick out their materials.

  One hour later, the classroom was in shambles. Scraps of materials were strewn everywhere. Glue was dripping off the edges of several desks. Unbeknownst to him, Ralph had a red fleece triangle glued to the side of his head. More students were talking than working.

  Striker’s own scarf wasn’t much to look at. He’d tried to work in some Christmas spirit, but all of his fleece Christmas trees turned out as rectangles. The toy soldier he’d tried to fashion looked like a robot.

  “Oh, well,” he thought. “Robots probably celebrate Christmas, too.”

  Even Sheila had lost steam. She had started with very grandiose plans, but somewhere along the way, she’d been sidetracked by talking with another girl about her Christmas plans. Now, she was surrounded by ten different colors of fleece with dozens of cutout pieces littered across her desk.

  She noticed Striker watching her and smiled.

  “I think I bit off more than I can chew,” she said.

  Striker laughed.

  “Keep it down, guys,” said an irritated voice. Striker and Sheila turned in surprise to look at Amy. She was putting the finishing touches on her scarf.

  Striker and Bill had been watching her with interest for the past hour. (Striker reflected that this was probably why they’d gotten so little work done on their own scarves.) Amy had been working very diligently on her scarf. Once she’d helped Sheila pick out materials, she had selected a few colors of her own and returned to her seat, where she worked quietly for the entire hour. Now, she had a pretty, snowy white scarf with a pattern of blue and purple snowflakes scattered across the ends. It wasn’t a masterpiece, but it was the best in the class.

  Bill had been observing Amy with mounting amazement. Now, he shook his head slowly, looking from Amy’s scarf to Sheila’s mess.

  “I don’t know how you predicted that,” he whispered to Striker. “But I’ve got a funny feeling that I have to say goodbye to my goody bag.”

  “Don’t worry,” said Striker, snagging the bag from Bill’s desk. “I’ll find a good home for it.”

  How did Striker know?

  Solution

  It’s difficult to work hard on something if you know it’s just going to be taken away from you, even if it is for a good cause. For that reason, we all put more effort into things that we own ourselves. We know we will reap the benefits of our work.

  So, when the class heard that the scarves would all be donated, most decided not to give the project their best effort. Even Sheila, who enjoyed fashion design so much, was unable to keep up her enthusiasm. She spent most of the time talking with a neighbor about the upcoming Christmas vacation rather than working on the scarf that she would never be able to wear herself.

  However, one person in the class would be able to benefit from the project—the student who was actually in the Chorale Pals. As a chorus member, Amy would be able to keep her scarf and wear it while caroling at the nursing home. Since she would be able to reap the benefits of her own work, Striker knew that she had good reason to put in more effort and make a scarf she could be proud of. And that’s exactly what happened.

  Striker walked home that afternoon munching on Bill’s candy. He’d graciously allowed Bill to keep the caramels, but he’d insisted on keeping all the chocolate himself.

  It was going to be a good holiday.

  Chapter 7: Auction Action

  Striker’s school was putting on a charity auction to help the homeless. Each grade had two volunteers to help collect donations and organize the auction, and Striker and Bill were the volunteers from their grade.

  One Wednesday in the middle of the collection drive, Striker was halfway through a book report when he was interrupted by a special announcement over the intercom.

  “Attention, students,” they heard the principal’s voice say, “I’m very sorry to announce that we have had a robbery. Someone has stolen the money we collected to donate to the homeless shelter. If anyone has any information about this, please speak to your teacher immediately. We are offering a $20 reward to whoever helps us locate the money.”

  Striker looked across the aisle at Bill. They each seemed to be asking the same thing. Who would steal from the homeless?

  For the rest of the school day, the robbery was all the students could talk about. Everyone was speculating on who could have done it, and what had happened to the money.

  “Maybe a teacher took it,” said Bill.

  “Nah, why would a teacher do that?” said Amy. “It was probably a student. Kids never have any money.”

  “Maybe someone came in from outside the school. It wouldn’t seem so bad if it was a stranger who took it,” said Sheila.

  All the students in the school had volunteered to be searched. All the desks and backpacks were checked too, and still the money was missing.

  After lunch, Strik
er and Bill were excused from class to help collect the items donated to the charity auction. Each classroom had a box that the students had been filling with donations.

  “Excuse me, sir,” said Striker, entering one classroom. “I’m here to collect the charity auction donations.”

  “Oh, certainly,” said the teacher. “But I thought the boxes weren’t going to be collected until tomorrow.”

  “Well,” answered Striker, “the principal thought that, after the robbery, maybe it would be best to go ahead and collect the items now. That way they’ll be in a safe place until the auction on Saturday.”

  “Ah,” said the teacher. “Good idea.”

  Striker and Bill collected boxes for about an hour, going to every classroom in their grade and delivering the boxes to an empty classroom. After the work was done, the principal locked the door behind them and sent the two boys back to class.

  On their way back to class, Bill said, “Well, at least no one can reach that stuff.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Striker. “I can’t believe the money’s gone, but it would be twice as bad if all the donations for the auction disappeared, too.”

  The next day after school, Striker and Bill stayed behind to sort through their grade’s donations. It was their job to categorize the items.

  “Man,” said Bill, looking at the pile of donations. “We might be here a little while. What a lot of stuff.”

  “Yeah,” agreed Striker. “I don’t think Ms. Peters expected us to get this many donations. We should find some other people to help.”

  “Yeah,” teased Bill, “Maybe we could convince Sheila to come help us.”

  Striker turned red. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  “Sure,” said Bill laughing.

  “Never mind,” said Striker, turning redder still. “Just help me with these boxes.”

  They sat down and began sorting through the items.

  “Let’s make separate piles,” suggested Striker. “We can put clothing here, books and magazines in the corner, artwork on the table, and videos and DVDs under the blackboard.”

  “Fine by me,” said Bill. “But what exactly should we do with things like this?”

  He held up what seemed to be a large rubber band.

  “I think that’s for exercising,” said Striker doubtfully. “You stretch it between your arms.”

  “Like this?” asked Bill, stretching the rubber band across his chest.

  “Be careful,” warned Striker a moment too late. Bill had not been quite strong enough to stretch the band as far as he did. The rubber band flew out of his right hand and shot across the room straight at Striker.

  “Whoa!” shouted Striker, diving out of the way and crashing into the pile of boxes. The rubber band just missed Striker’s feet as they flew sideways.

  “Sorry!” said Bill when Striker had landed. “Are you ok?”

  Striker was quiet for a moment. “Let’s make one more pile—crazy and dangerous items. By the pencil sharpener.”

  After about 30 minutes of working, Striker called out, “Hey, cool!” He had just unearthed a large cowboy hat and was strutting around the room with it on his head.

  Bill laughed. “Yeah, well look at this!” He had found a shaggy blue wig. He put it on, shaking it back and forth like a rock star. Striker laughed.

  The two boys eventually set back down to work, but continued wearing their new headgear. They worked hard, sometimes talking, sometimes not. The big general pile was slowly getting smaller.

  Suddenly, Striker heard Bill give a sharp gasp. “What is it?” he asked.

  “Striker, look at this!” Billy had an orange pencil box sitting open in his lap. When he tilted it so that Striker could see inside, Striker too gasped. Inside the box was a large pile of money. They dumped the money on the floor and together counted $250!

  “That must be the stolen charity money!” exclaimed Striker.

  “But why was it in with the donations?” asked Bill.

  “Maybe whoever took it was trying to hide it for a little while. Remember, everybody was volunteering to be searched, so the thief couldn’t have kept it on himself.”

  “But putting it with the donations doesn’t seem so smart, either,” said Bill. “Now we have it!”

  “Yes, but they didn’t know we’d have it, did they? We picked up the boxes a day early,” replied Striker.

  “Wow. Well, I’m glad we’ve got the money back now. The principal will be really happy about that. Though it’s too bad we’ll never know who actually took it in the first place.”

  “Maybe we can find out,” said Striker. “Just maybe…”

  Two days later, the auction was in full swing. Most of the school kids had turned up with their parents to take part in the bidding. Striker sat near the back. He wanted to be able to see his fellow bidders.

  Several items were auctioned off before it got to the item Striker was most interested in. When the orange pencil box was brought out on stage, he sat up as straight as he could and got ready to bid.

  The bidding began at ten cents.

  “10 cents,” said a boy Striker recognized from another classroom named Josh McMillan.

  “25 cents,” called a girl from Striker’s class, Jane Lincoln.

  “50 cents,” shouted Zack Marcus.

  “One dollar,” shouted Josh again.

  “$1.50,” called a new bidder, and “$2.50,” shouted yet another bidder.

  As the bidding continued up to $5, Striker silently wondered which person in the room was the culprit. Several people were now fighting over the box. When the pencil box hit $6, though, several bidders began to drop out. Unfortunately, not enough people dropped out to give Striker a clear view of what he needed to know. He decided it was time for a drastic move.

  “Thirty dollars,” he bid loudly.

  A murmur went through the crowd. He could see people turning to get a look at the boy who had bid so much for such a small pencil box. His own mother sitting next to him turned to him with a very surprised look on her face.

  “Thirty dollars?” she whispered. “What on earth are you doing?”

  “Trust me,” Striker whispered back.

  She gave Striker a concerned look, but said nothing.

  The auctioneer, who had stopped momentarily out of surprise, suddenly seemed to remember himself. “The bid is at thirty dollars,” he said.

  No one spoke. Striker sat waiting. He was sure his plan would work.

  “Thirty dollars going once.”

  Striker squirmed ever so slightly in his seat. He certainly hoped his plan was going to work.

  “Thirty dollars going twice.”

  Striker was getting a little worried, and his mother looked downright alarmed. Now that he thought about it, thirty dollars was a lot of money. And it looked like he might have to pay it after all…

  “Come on,” thought Striker. “Come on…”

  “So—” started the auctioneer, until he was cut off by the cry of another boy a few rows ahead of Striker. It was Josh McMillan.

  “Thirty-one!” shouted Josh.

  Breathing a quick sigh of relief, Striker was instantly on his feet. “That’s him!” he cried to the principal. “Josh must have stolen the money!”

  How did Striker know?

  Solution

  Striker knew that the only way to discover the culprit was to get him to expose himself. By keeping the pencil box in the auction, he was able to do just that. He knew that only the thief expected the pencil box to be filled with money, and so only the thief would be willing to pay a very high price to buy it back. After all, everyone else simply thought it was a nice, but ordinary, orange pencil box. They might be willing to pay $5 or so, but only the thief would be willing to pay a large amount like $31.

  Striker and Bill took the $20 reward money and bought two items from the charity auction. As they walked home that evening, they were a very conspicuous pair—one boy swaggering in an enormous cowboy hat and
the other bouncing along in a shiny, electric blue wig.

  Chapter 8: The Egg Hunt Hoodwink

  It was Easter, and the Johnsons were throwing their annual Easter egg hunt for all the neighborhood kids. Striker met Bill at the corner of his street, and they walked over together.

  “Man, I just love egg hunts,” said Bill as they neared the Johnson’s. “Every year the competition gets fiercer, but this year I’m ready.” He pointed to his shoes.

  “Bill,” asked Striker, stifling a laugh, “are those track shoes?”

  “They sure are,” said Bill. “Ralph is not out-hunting me this year. I’m prepared. Look, they’ve even got little spikes on them. Those are for improved traction.”

  “Very impressive,” said Striker laughing. “I’m sure Mrs. Johnson will appreciate you poking holes all over her yard.”

  “Well, that’s the price you pay for hosting an egg hunt. This is war, Striker.”

  They reached the front door and rang the doorbell. When the door was opened by Mrs. Johnson and her son Ralph, they walked inside, giving polite hellos to Mrs. Johnson and nods to Ralph. Both Bill’s and Striker’s moms had made them promise to be nice.

  “Hopefully, a nod is nice enough for one day,” thought Striker.

  “Hello, boys,” said Mrs. Johnson. “Just go through to the backyard. That’s where everyone is.”

  By then, the party was in full swing. Mrs. Johnson had made lots of cookies and brownies, and Mr. Johnson had whipped up a batch of his special wildberry punch that the kids all looked forward to every year. When Striker stepped out through the back door, the first person he noticed was Sheila. She was wearing a sundress, and he felt the stomach butterflies starting up immediately. Luckily, he was immediately distracted as Mrs. Johnson announced that it was time to begin. Striker joined the other kids scrambling for a basket to collect their eggs.

  Once everyone had found a basket, they lined up along the back porch, waiting for the signal to start hunting. Striker looked to his left and let out a laugh when he saw Bill. Bill had taken a red bandana out of his pocket and tied it around his head.