Who Should be Banker in Monopoly?

Monopoly is a classic board game and can be hours of fun trading and buying properties.  

Intrinsically, children can develop negotiation skills, resource, financial and strategy skills while playing this fun game. 

In every game, there needs to be a banker who helps facilitate transactions with the bank. The banker needs to give correct change when players are buying property, organise the auction, ensure community chest and chance cards are received or paid correctly. 

Generally there is a perception that the banker is good with money and can handle various mathematical equations that might pop up in the game. When a group of young children play the game, who do you think will be selected as banker?

With Sydney property prices soaring, the Australian version of Monopoly looks to emulate the current market with property in the millions and not hundreds.  

Every time you pass GO, instead of collecting $200 you collect $2,000,000. Pretty good pay day if you ask me. When children play the Australian version, many of them struggle with the extra zeros in place. A common mistake is differentiating between ten thousand and a hundred thousand. 

The other aspect in the game that baffles many children is the chance cards that requires mental maths. 

A scenario could be a player has 8 apartments and 2 hotels. The chance card says you need to pay tax $40,000 per apartment and $1.5M per hotel. Children who has strong number sense will able to perform these calculations almost instantly. Where as children that don’t have foundational maths skills will feel confused and lost with this scenario. 

I recently watched a group of 8 year old girls play this version of Monopoly. What I observed, is that the girl who was confident in mathematics was nominated the banker. She led the game and directed the other girls on what to do when difficult scenarios arose. Her confidence in maths translated to confidence in other activities during the game. When the girls were unsure of the rules, her authority as banker decided which rules they were going to adhere to. 

Maths is a necessary foundation for every child. Number sense is a unique ability to see comparisons, relationships and patterns which allows doing things like mental maths more easily. Children who struggle with number sense can have trouble with basic maths operations. This can lead to challenges in school and in everyday life. 

Here at Mathnasium of Carlingford, we help every child reach their potential, by teaching them maths in a way that makes sense to them.  

As a maths only specialist, we would love to discuss ways in which we can help your child develop number sense. Please contact us [email protected] for a free assessment. 

We hope to develop number sense so your child will be confident as banker next time they play Monopoly.