The Commemorative Coin Act of 1996 was signed into law.

"The Congress shall have Power To…coin Money, regulate the Value thereof…"

—The Constitution of the United States of America, Article 1., Section 8

The U.S. Mint is the department of government that actually makes our coins, but it is Congress that passes the laws that authorize minting of new coins or making changes to existing ones. One such change occurred in 1996, when Delaware Congressman Michael Castle proposed a bill to create a series of quarters commemorating each of the States that make up the United States of America. In 1996, President Clinton signed the bill into law, and starting in 1999 and continuing through 2008, the Mint released five coins per year, in the order in which the States were admitted to the Union. The coins have become quite popular with collectors, who now eagerly anticipate the release of each year’s new set.

Illuminations
In Trading for Quarters (Pre-K–2), young students listen to a story and then examine a quarter. They find sets of coins equivalent to a quarter using pennies, nickels and dimes, and then estimate and count coin collections by fives and tens using both handheld and online calculators. Finally, students pose and solve original coin puzzles.

In How Many Ways? (Pre-K–2), children estimate the value of collections of pennies, nickels and dimes. They visit a government Web site and make sets of coins with a given value and record them in a table. As an extension, they can also make and record patterns with the coins.

EconEdLink
Changes in Change (3–5) begins with an online activity that gives students practice in counting money. A second activity goes one step further, as students are given opportunities to make change for make-believe purchases.

In The Changing Face of Money (K–2), students play a game to guess which objects have been used as money throughout history. In the process, they learn several basic economic concepts. In one of the activities, students use a Venn diagram to compare new quarters with older ones.

ARTSEDGE
In "Lily's Purple Plastic Purse," Lily gets into trouble for interrupting class to show off her three shiny quarters and her purple plastic purse, which makes music when it is opened. In Jingly Coins (K–4), students play with different kinds of coins to see which ones make the loudest and softest sounds. They locate the states represented by the new U.S. quarters on a map. They then make a purple purse that can also function as a percussion instrument.