Designing mathematical tasks to enhance financial literacy among children in Grades 1–8

ABSTRACT One approach to incorporating financial literacy into educational curricula is the integration of it into closely related courses such as mathematics. Research on curriculum development that fosters the integration of mathematics and financial literacy is necessary. This study aims to develop mathematical tasks that are embedded with financial literacy concepts to be integrated into mathematics courses. The tasks were designed for children in Grades 1 through 8. They were shaped by considering mathematical education standards, concepts, subjects and objectives. The tasks also addressed related societal issues including fair wages and working conditions. The dynamics that shape the design of the tasks include the interrelationship between mathematics education and financial literacy, children's (as the target age group) financial understanding and task design parameters. Each task, on the one hand, contains the first page geared toward students; on the other, it presents the implementation steps, teaching guidelines, cautions and limitations for teachers as well as background served as the inspiration for the task design. It is expected that the tasks will contribute to the development of students from an early age in financial literacy education as well as be beneficial for relevant experimental studies.


Introduction
Financial literacy is considered to be a twenty-first century skill that is growing in popularity due to the increasing individual responsibility required of every citizen in financial matters (Lusardi, 2015). The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development [OECD] has included the domain of financial literacy into the Programme for International Student Assessment [PISA] since 2012 and defines the concept as follows: Financial literacy is knowledge and understanding of financial concepts and risks, and the skills, motivation and confidence to apply such knowledge and understanding in order to make effective decisions across a range of financial contexts, to improve the financial wellbeing of individuals and society, and to enable participation in economic life. (OECD, 2014, p. 33) Socioeconomic issues, economic crises, technological developments, and political decisions on finance drag individuals to make proper financial decisions from an early age. Children should be able to manage their pocket money and their shopping, balance savings for products that they want to buy and generally be ready for financial activities that they will encounter in the near future like paying bills, getting loans and gaining economic independence (Bidwell, 2013;Bosshardt & Walstad, 2018). Financial literacy does not only comprise checking the monthly budget; it requires complex skills beyond understanding money. In addition, there are many factors affecting the individual in financial matters, such as advertisements, social media and their social environment (Gudmunson & Danes, 2011;Lucey et al., 2015;Oehler & Wendt, 2017). The individual should make appropriate financial decisions because individuals have to live with the consequences of these decisions. It has been observed that individuals who have had no financial experience and no financial education from a young age live in unstable financial circumstances (Brown et al., 2016;Lusardi et al., 2010). Because this triggers the need for financial literacy to be integrated into education, it has become one of the prominent subjects of G20 meetings (Davies, 2015;OECD, 2017).
In light of these circumstances, some countries, such as Canada, the United States and Singapore, have attempted to integrate financial literacy into their education systems. These initiatives, besides creating a separate course on financial literacy, also include studies on its integration into related courses, such as mathematics (Ministry of Education Ontario, 2010).
By its nature, financial literacy has an intimate relationship with mathematics (Lusardi, 2012). Mathematical literacy is recognized as a prerequisite for financial literacy (OECD, 2016). While financial situations frequently take place as a context in mathematical problems, mathematical processes and contents are used as a tool in solving financial problems. From the perspective of financial literacy education, financial literacy and mathematics are not separate fields. They feed each other and are in a wide context that enables them to be addressed together (Sawatzki & Sullivan, 2018). Thus, developing financial skills in mathematics as one of the main courses, especially in primary education, can contribute to both fields.
There are studies on the classroom implementations of the integration of financial literacy education, especially those related to mathematics (Blue & Grootenboer, 2019;Blue et al., 2018;Dituri et al., 2019;Sole, 2017). In these studies, in general, progressing in specific financial processes and their relations with mathematical skills is handled through instructional design. For this purpose, in the studies using the current curriculums, task design stages are also encountered (Sawatzki, 2017).
Tasks are tools to shape the learners' experience and understanding through activities that are generally based on directions (Willis, 1996). They provide a systematic structure and balance for the progression of lessons and assessments. Each task, along with the set it belongs to, is a mini-learning activity designed in accordance with the planned progress (Watson, 2016). A task design has cognitive, emotional, and sociocultural aspects (Kieran et al., 2015). Designing tasks according to this perspective is one of the critical aspects of financial literacy education as well. Such tasks can enable soft integration without interference with curricula in both financial courses and related courses such as mathematics. Also, designing the tasks to universal standards expands their area of use. Furthermore, comprehensive structures of tasks from pre-learning to evaluation processes can lead to the systematic development of financial literacy competency (Geiger et al., 2015).
This study presents a research project that aims to prepare mathematical tasks with a financial literacy perspective that can be integrated into mathematics courses. These tasks provide alternative activities for teachers. They are prepared for students from grade 1 to grade 8 in elementary and middle school by considering general mathematics education standards, concepts, subjects and objectives.
The theoretical framework that guides the design of tasks constitutes two parts. First of all, we think that the interrelationship between these two fields should be exhibited for the organization of the tasks to be addressed in mathematics education. In addition to the conceptual aspect of this interrelationship, it is essential to present the perspectives of international organizations that are interested in the interrelationship as well as its discussions in experimental research. On the other hand, taking into account the study's objectives, it is valuable that research concentrating on this interrelationship with task design be handled in a way that allows for discussion of this study in the literature. Section 2 has been structured as a theoretical framework in this regard.
Second, it is thought that the research's target group -children -needs to have their financial literacy understanding addressed. This is initially described in the heading of Background, Section 3. Then, by including a systematic framework on how the task design, which is the study's major purpose, can be fulfilled, it is aimed to discuss all dimensions of the research in detail and evaluate the tasks within this framework.
The increase in studies on financial literacy in the field of mathematics education brings with it the need to create resources regarding the interrelationship. In this context, the tasks are prepared with a related project aim in mind: to provide examples that can be used in both fields by creating a comprehensive substructure.

The interrelationship between financial literacy and mathematics education
Mathematical and financial literacy provides practical solutions to real-life problems (Lusardi, 2015). The National Council of Teachers of Mathematics [NCTM] encourages the examination of the relationship between mathematics and financial literacy (NCTM, 2011). In addition, it has been noted that in some countries that care about this relationship, such as Canada (Ontario) and Australia, there have been attempts to integrate financial literacy skills into mathematics courses (Australian Securities and Investments Commission [ASIC], 2011; Ministry of Education Ontario, 2010). PISA reports state that financial literacy and mathematical literacy have a significant correlation (0.83) (OECD, 2014) and that there are many interrelationships in PISA mathematical and financial literacy questions (Ozkale & Ozdemir Erdogan, 2022).
In the studies focusing on the interrelationship between mathematics and financial literacy, despite the lack of common studies, this integration is encouraged. This suggests that mathematics courses including systematic and in-depth implementations of personal finance can be particularly effective (Dituri et al., 2019).
Studies conducted at different educational levels on this interrelationship demonstrate that mathematics lessons are supported with resources from both fields (Dituri et al., 2019). Blue et al. (2018) note that financial literacy education for the elementary school level should include cognitive and emotional contributions in addition to addressing mathematical skills. For this purpose, they offer a compassionate approach that includes a social aspect. One of the main criticisms of financial literacy education is that its pedagogical aspect needs to be strengthened. Blue et al. (2018) states that this deficiency can be overcome depending on the interests of the circles that are carrying out educational activities. In Dituri et al.'s (2019) study, the authors claim that mathematics is an appropriate environment for financial literacy because of the relations between them. After this project-based study was conducted, significant differences were identified in the financial development of students. Students had positive attitudes and demonstrated basic financial behaviours. Also, teachers contributing to the research declared that the research provides strong support for financial literacy education. However, not all initiatives on financial education produce positive results.
Another aspect of financial literacy in mathematics is the preparation of lesson plans or tasks that reflect this interrelationship. Sawatzki (2017) conducted a study on including financial literacy tasks for grades five and six. The process is evaluated in terms of students' successes as well as task design principles. Sawatzki suggests that designing financial literacy tasks for mathematics lessons for unfamiliar and imaginable problems like PISA questions can lead students to broaden their horizons (Sawatzki, 2017;Sawatzki & Sullivan, 2018). Ozkale and Ozdemir Erdogan (2020) offer a framing model for the documentation of this interrelationship, including sample questions or tasks, based on three main dimensions: content, context and processes. According to the model, an environment should be formed in a financial context. Also, it uses mathematical content along with common process skills. Mathematical processes in this model, such as manipulating, representing and communicating, are considered to be part of financial literacy as well (Kieran, 2004;Leung & Bolite Frant, 2015). In this respect, Ozkale and Ozdemir Erdogan (2022) determine the common processing skills comprising the dynamics of both areas.
Since the main purpose of this study is to prepare tasks on financial literacy for students up to grade 8, children's financial understanding and task design parameters are addressed in section 3.

Children's financial understanding
The tasks discussed in this research address students up to grade 8. Therefore, the status and development of financial concepts in children's mental worlds is an important aspect of shaping the tasks. This is a perspective that needs to be taken into account in order to decide which financial concepts should be included in the tasks and how deeply they should be addressed, as well as to reflect the links recognized by children between financial concepts.
Children may have perceptions that are not accurate about finance in early ages (Berti & Bombi, 1988). In these years, they have limited knowledge, along with many misconceptions (Webley, 2005). Although the financial literacy field has been popular since the 2000s, the financial understanding of children has been studied since the 1950s (Berti & Bombi, 1988;Strauss, 1952). In this regard, both learning and developing children's financial understanding are separate topics that should be considered in financial literacy education (Aprea, 2015). Basic financial concepts for children and the stages that indicate their cognitive development of financial understanding are important aspects of this study.
The first financial concepts that children encounter are money and payment regardless of values (Abramovitch et al., 1991). Children's perception of money progresses from a paper (banknote) to an instrument of exchange in shopping. Their experiences, such as looking at the prices, expanding the circle of products and even bartering, improve their financial perceptions (Siegler & Thompson, 1998).
Another thought process that develops in childhood is how to earn money, as children observe that people have to work to earn it. Consequently, the concept of a job brings with it the concepts of working or unemployment (Webley, 2005). The economic conditions of families and the social circle around them also raise their awareness about wealth and poverty (Webley, 2005). When accompanying their parent to withdraw money from a bank, they start to think of financial institutions. Thoughts develop regarding the idea that banks are places that not only give money but also help people save and increase money in time (Duveen, 2013).
Another dimension of children's financial understanding is that their environments and perceptions shape it. Berti and Bombi (1988) highlight that the meanings of financial concepts in children's minds change and expand over time and they interpret them based on their perceptions of the world. The progressing of the financial development of children runs through a path from Stage 0 to Stage 5, as designed based on Piaget's cognitive developmental model (Piaget, 1964). An example of the progress through the stages is given in Table 1 for the concepts of banks, money and pricing.
Prior to Piaget's first critical threshold, conceptions of the intuitive level (6-7 years old) is Stage 0, where the thinking and concepts in children's minds are separate from reality and cannot be linked to the financial world. In Stage 1 and Stage 2, children respectively address each concept, independent from other concepts, then in the context of other different concepts they know. They can also eventually focus on the sub concepts contained therein. These stages occur prior to the second critical threshold, conceptions of the formal period (11-14 years old). In Stage 3, they begin to think of these conceptions in detail. Understanding the financial world along with the reasoning and meaning of financial issues, concepts and individual experiences starts from Stage 3. Berti and Bombi (1988) note that Stage 3 can start in 10-12 year olds in parallel with the formal period of Piaget. The higher levels, Stage 4 and Stage 5, are based on the prior stages and are observed in higher age groups without limitations (Berti & Bombi, 1988;Webley, 2005).
The understanding of financial concepts in children's minds is seen as a necessary step to organize the tasks in this study. Thus, a theoretical basis is established on how to select financial concepts and to address these concepts according to the levels and children's cognitive development stages. Another theoretical basis for the tasks is task design principles and parameters.  (Berti & Bombi, 1988

Task design parameters
Parameters are the criteria that regulate tasks steps from design to implementation (Watson, 2016). Each task is planned purposefully regarding how it should be designed and processed. Figure 1 indicates the parameters in various studies by considering their similarities and relations.
Mathematical tasks are tools used to activate mathematical processes (Kieran et al., 2015;Swan & Burkhardt, 2012). For this reason, the questions should be process-oriented, especially targeting reasoning, rather than result-oriented. Tasks should encourage teamwork, discussion and the development of literacy skills beyond just mathematical knowledge. The mathematical tasks contain three main functions: understanding, doing and being interested in mathematics (Van de Walle et al., 2007). According to Kieran (2004), manipulating, representing and reasoning are the fundamental dynamic processes of a task. A task design should link its aim to students' cognitive processes and explain how these processes lead them to the intended learning outcomes (Geiger et al., 2015). The common process skills used in this research are defined by Ozkale and Ozdemir Erdogan (2022) in the framework of financial and mathematical literacy skills. These skills approach fundamental mathematical processes such as reasoning, representing, reflecting and manipulating from a financial perspective. These common processes are used because they are related to both areas, forming a common substructure.
Tasks are built on the subject and learning outcomes that form financial expectations. In this regard, designing tasks should be related to conceptual grounds such as conceptual development, misconceptions, difficulties and pre-learning (Swan, 2007). Besides that, teaching and learning strategies, tools and technology are also important aspects for task design (Komatsu & Jones, 2019;Watson & Thompson, 2015).
The demands of the tasks should be transparent in order to facilitate the observation of students' steps (Swan & Burkhardt, 2012). Furthermore, constructing layered, accessible challenges for each student level not only increases the motivation on the task but also creates levels within the assessment norms. For these layers, some criteria such as unfamiliarity and technical demand balancing the difficulties of questions can be used (Burkhardt & Swan, 2013).
While tasks present the expectations from the students through the implementation steps, they should also provide a natural learning environment and flexibility for students as well as teachers. In particular, students have to be free to understand the task, think about the solutions as well as perform. Tasks have to have a planned goal and background. However, students' performance and experiences also have a predominant role in the implementation of tasks (Barzel et al., 2013;Watson, 2016). Furthermore, tasks should excite students, as well as lead to deep thought using original and attractive contexts like human rights, disability, etc. They also should be adapted to the local values according to cultural norms (Bartolini Bussi et al., 2013).
Mathematical tasks can be classified in accordance with students' profiles as expert tasks that do not require support or novice and expert tasks that do require the support (Burkhardt & Swan, 2013). Mathematical tasks can be designed in many variations to regulate writing, listening and speaking skills (Burkhardt & Swan, 2013). These options can be used to support students and enable teachers to control learning outputs.
In designing the tasks, besides the task design parameters and children's financial understanding, universal mathematics education standards, mathematical topics for Grades 1-8, and fundamental mathematical learning outcomes are taken into consideration so that the tasks address mathematics courses of different countries (NCTM, 2000; Van de Walle et al., 2007). While the design focuses on how conceptual and cognitive relationships are organized, it can be more efficient that tasks have a social face linked to real life.
A template was created for tasks (Appendix 1) that reflects their background as well as their interrelationship. The structure of the tasks denotes the roles of teachers and students as priority interlocutors (Watson & Thompson, 2015). The first page is for students. On this page, visuals attracting the students' attention to the task and explanations to make it easier to understand the setting are given together with instructions about the materials, technologies and information that students can use. On the second page, guide explanations are given for teachers. This page includes the time required for each task; the implementation steps to be followed by the teacher; relations with pre-learning, cognitive and developmental limitations and cautions regarding international and local values. On the third page, which we can call the background, the mathematical and financial substructure of the task, acquisitions and expectations, what the common process skills represent as well as the descriptions of the design of the task are presented along with references.
In this research, containing about 50 tasks, the important aspects of the background, as well as the interrelationship between mathematical and financial literacy, are addressed along with discussions in the notes regarding how they were dealt with when the tasks were being designed. In the exploration section, which includes examples, quotes from the tasks and the mathematical and financial grounds on which the tasks are based, the reflections of the interrelationship, the limitations and the potential of the tasks are presented.

Exploring the interrelationship between financial literacy and mathematics education in the design
In the design of the tasks, attention was paid to addressing both the mathematical substructure and financial expectations together. For example, in a task concentrating on the concept of unit price, the mathematical substructure is based on measurement and fractions operations along with metric conversions. In terms of the financial aspect, beyond unit price, the options are discussed, such as 'Do you prefer the cheapest one?', 'Which one is proper for you?' as well as the differences in pricing between products of the same brand or between products of different brands. This task focuses on the students' pricing processes and is designed to coincide with the financial development of children (Piaget, 1964). Based on the literature and on the assumption that financial education provided from an early age may have positive effects, the aim is to achieve a mutual transfer of existing skills from the known to the unknown in the mathematical and financial fields (Blue et al., 2018;Dituri et al., 2019;Sole, 2014). In this context, intense, meaningful and usable relationships are established between money and numbers; for example, the euro-cent relationship as well as basic mathematical operations strategies are integrated into money transactions (Abramovitch et al., 1991;Sole, 2014).
The mathematical expectations of the tasks are shaped according to three main mathematical activities: understanding mathematics, doing mathematics and interest in mathematics (Van de Walle et al., 2007). Reasoning is one of the processes that support this structure in all the tasks. Various sub processes, such as procedural and conceptual understanding, evaluating financial situations, comparing options, identifying the financial processes and recognizing relationships are included in the reasoning processes (Kilpatrick, 2001;Pugalee, 1999). Thus, the goal is that students develop awareness about financial situations in addition to financial practice. Reasoning processes are also supported by the processes of manipulating, representing and communicating (Kieran, 2004;Leung & Bolite Frant, 2015). In this context, the manipulation of prices and estimation through multiple calculations are considered. Furthermore, students are encouraged to share their thoughts and results and ask questions by studying in groups (Geiger et al., 2015). Furthermore, the tasks use various representation tools, including tables and graphs, which are valuable for financial understanding. Besides that, technological tools are used in higher grades, corresponding with children's developmental levels and interests (Aprea, 2015). However, considering the learning environments of students, a limited number of applications, such as dynamic geometry software, are included, except for calculators, searching on the internet or spreadsheets. As such, the tasks establish intense, meaningful and usable relationships through common processes. Some of them, such as reasoning, manipulating and estimating, representing and communicating, are used more frequently in parallel with other studies, while it can be stated that the processes of problemsolving and modelling along with using technology have not been developed to the same extent (Dituri et al., 2019;Geiger et al., 2015;Kieran, 2004;Leung & Bolite Frant, 2015;Sawatzki, 2017).

Exploring children's financial understanding in the design
Financial concepts included in the tasks are shown in Figure 2, which indicates their relationships with the main financial literacy contexts. Because money is at the centre of financial decisions, it is included in all of the tasks by focusing on the type of money and currency. While the relations between different types of money are the focal point in the beginning levels, parities of currencies of various countries are considered in advanced ones. Similarly, as shopping is a common economic activity at all ages, related concepts like receipts are frequently used.
The tasks contain brief information about financial situations because children in early ages are probably hearing of the concepts for the first time. Also, the tasks are designed by considering the stages of financial understandings along with children's cognitive development. For instance, the processes regarding pricing in the tasks start in the earlier levels with a question: 'What can we buy with this money?' Then, the task focuses on the pricing criteria of various products.
In the tasks, in the intuitive level at the beginning grades (Grade 1 and 2), meaningful matches between prices and products are emphasized and examples are designed to help children to recognize the value of money. However, intense comparisons between product prices are avoided (see Figure 2) (Piaget, 1964).
In the tasks, in the intuitive level for lower grades (1 and 2), meaningful connections between prices and products are emphasized and examples are designed to help children to  recognize the value of money. However, complicated comparisons between product prices are avoided (see Figure 3) (Piaget, 1964).
In the concrete operatory period (up to grade 5), the tasks focus on children's thoughts on financial behaviours according to economic status (see Figure 4) while in the formal period (11-14 years old), bank transactions, parameters of bills, comparisons of prices and earnings as well as abstract concepts such as working and unemployment are discussed (Piaget, 1964). Financial concepts and facts are offered in the tasks from various aspects at different levels so that children can expand on their meaning. For example, while one task focuses on the value of taxes for the government and society, another task deals with various ratios and calculations of taxes. Tasks for lower grades focus on the comparisons of figures while tasks for higher grades focus on the reasons behind them. In addition, concepts that affect the price, such as wholesale and instalment, are included in these tasks. In Figure 5, the electricity bills from two private electricity distribution companies are compared in terms of pricing and presentation.
The tasks try to demonstrate the factors that affect the prices from producers to costumers (Siegler & Thompson, 1998). In higher grades, Stages 4 and 5 focus on detailed questions, such as 'How can prices be manipulated?' as well as price tracking, optimum price and optimum timing (Berti & Bombi, 1988;Webley, 2005). A similar progression is used with the concept of earnings, starting with working conditions, including working hours and overtime. Then, minimum wages are compared across the world. Furthermore, awareness of earnings and other criteria are raised via reasoning regarding different jobs and their specific conditions (Duveen, 2013;Webley, 2005).

Exploring the task design parameters in the tasks
The tasks are evaluated according to the task design parameters within the framework of purpose, roles, and conceptual base. The task questions have a simple and understandable language, express their expectations of students along with related images (Burkhardt & Figure 5. A comparison of electricity bills for optimum choice. Swan, 2013). In addition to requesting the students' answers in writing, questions based on their speaking and listening skills are also integrated into the tasks. Both novice and expert tasks are organized by considering the students' cognitive levels and developmental processes along with their pre-learning (Burkhardt & Swan, 2013). In this regard, in general, novice tasks are designed to have more explanations and images. Also, most of them contain statements and limited options, such as multiple choice or true-false answers, because at these levels, students may not be able to use the correct expressions for their thoughts verbally or in writing (Burkhardt & Swan, 2013). Expert tasks are organized for higher grades based on their experiences with the novice tasks. Especially in expert tasks, conversions between representations along with reasoning processes and evaluations are used together (Burkhardt & Swan, 2013). For example, in the task based on the conversions of representations of percentages, fractions and decimals, various VAT rates are evaluated; furthermore, a question is revealed on whether individuals are conscious about the taxes.
The design considers teachers to be primarily responsible for the execution of the tasks beyond being a guide (Watson, 2016). For this reason, the roles of teachers are expressed in detail in the implementation steps of the tasks. What is expected of teachers is to adjust the general structure of the task to the class. The instructions are stated both in the implementation steps and in the cautions about pre-learning, limitations and values. In this context, it can be said that the tasks contain limited adjustments in terms of local values and cognitive levels. Although tasks are carried out with some limitations, students should not feel restricted. For this reason, the tasks include some pedagogical and cognitive recommendations, providing the necessary flexibility for students in a natural learning environment (Ainley & Margolinas, 2015;Brousseau et al., 2014;Swan, 2007). The intent of this is to enable the tasks to progress according to students' perceptions, learning speed or as well as to anticipate potential issues (Barzel et al., 2013). Students may not be able to recognize the importance of financial concepts in a mathematics course. They may also consider them to be ordinary contexts for mathematics. In this regard, teachers are asked to draw attention to financial concepts. For this reason, the background of each task includes specific considerations and references to improve teachers' knowledge about financial literacy.
The implementation steps are shaped according to both the flow of the tasks and the learning steps of students. In these steps, after checking students' prior knowledge, perception and conceptual understandings, the judgments and analyses are detailed. In-depth discussions are designed for both answering questions as well as addressing the impacts of the task in real life. For instance, in one task based on the economic, social and health risks of smoking, the dramatic figures related to smoking damage are discussed. The task asks teachers to check students' learning strategies, misconceptions and difficulties to help them with small touches where necessary. When introducing the financial concepts for the first time, limitations are determined for teachers to help them explain the issue. The tasks ask teachers to help students establish connections between the real-life situation and mathematical solutions. Students in lower grades may struggle to read and understand mathematical representations, so some tips for potential problems are integrated into the implementation steps. For example, the fact that 100 cents are equal to one euro may cause an imbalance in their minds. In order to overcome this situation and to highlight the intensive use of this equation, it is included in the tasks and is discussed in the context of the specific reasons why many price tags include 99 cents.
In the design, authentic contexts are determined to process financial expectations. For this purpose, financial contexts are determined so that they are function as grounds for financial expectations. The tasks offer students the acquisition of financial concepts that they can benefit from currently as well as enable them to note concepts they will encounter in the future such as searching for jobs, working conditions and loans (Dituri et al., 2019;Sawatzki, 2017). In addition, focal points are determined through specific topics such as tax, compound interest, and unit price for financial expectations. On the other hand, the design takes care that the tasks refer to social issues. Various social issues such as human rights, fair wages, being disabled, environmental pollution, harmful addictions and helping people are integrated into the tasks. The aim is for students to become aware of social issues when they deal with financial and mathematical topics. For example, in one task, the concept of children's pocket money is discussed in relation to their age and gender; in addition, students' ideas are discussed in the context of equality. Furthermore, students' empathy skills are evaluated in the context of the behaviours of all the actors of a situation. Besides that, efforts are made to set up each task in a motivating and exciting structure (Xiao & O'Neill, 2016;Xiao & Porto, 2017). For example, the tasks focusing on taxes are discussed in the context of their impact on society. Moreover, current and popular issues such as minimalist lifestyles or the coronavirus are addressed in the tasks to keep students' interest. In a task on monthly bills using the concepts of percentages and fractions, the algebraic, numerical and visual representations of the billing items are examined and awareness is stimulated by comparing these bills with their real-life amounts.
The spiral approach is used in the distribution of tasks among the grades (Bruner, 1960;Fried & Amit, 2005). The tasks are grouped in terms of their topics and expectations. The groups are also arranged according to vertical or horizontal relations (Harden, 1999). Therefore, tasks address real-life situations step-by-step as well as repeatedly. Besides that, the difficulty levels of the tasks are divided into steps, from simple to complex. The tasks present knowledge, skills and experiences based on pre-learning (Snider, 2004). In this way, the aim is to increase the permanence and applicability of the students' experience and efforts at different times for the same concept. The tasks try to mirror the interrelationship not only in the numeric topics but also fields that can be integrated, such as geometry. Since the tasks are structured the same way, they are intended to be similar in terms of organization, question types, question sentences and approaches. In this way, we try to achieve consistency between the tasks.

Final remarks
We think that this study, which aims to develop mathematical tasks intertwined with the concepts of financial literacy to be integrated into mathematics lessons, can guide ideas on how the integration would be realized through its systematic structure.
In the study, financial concepts are integrated into the tasks in accordance with the children's financial understanding stages, taking into account their real-world effects. Nevertheless, new financial concepts may be added as well as financial concepts, which we use, may earn new meaning due to the current structure of the finance field. In future studies, the evolution of financial concepts can be addressed from this aspect.
It is evident in the literature that the success of financial education in higher grades is lower than in lower grades. We believe that systematic financial literacy education provided from primary education can have a positive effect on students' success. Also, we think that the tasks distributed via the spiral approach at all levels from Grades 1-8 can be integrated into the upper classes with minor adjustments.
We think that the tasks generally reflect the harmony between teacher-learnerenvironment tools and mathematical knowledge. Also, the tasks try to keep the students motivated and excited based on the parameters of unfamiliarity and accessible challenges. This structure may also be convenient for the assessment of students' performance.
The tasks do not offer teachers wide flexibility because the implementation steps are determined in detail. It is based on the idea that organizing a flexible structure for tasks actually means more effort for teachers. However, it can be expected that teachers and teacher candidates can keep up by gaining experience if they make use of similar tasks. The tasks put back neither mathematical acquisitions nor financial expectations. But mathematics teachers may be reluctant to focus on financial issues. Therefore, it is necessary to carry out studies so that teachers gain awareness starting from the teacher education periods. We think intensive discussions that will reveal students' thoughts by considering their interests may lead to positive attitudes to both financial and social issues.
We cannot say that we design the tasks with a neutral point of view. The design is rather more sensitive to individuals while being more critical of governments and financial institutions. Also, it supports the awareness of spending and saving while being against advertisements that encourage extravagance. In this respect, we can say that the tasks include financial knowledge, skills, and behaviour as well as emotion and have a philosophy.
This study is a part of a comprehensive project aimed at integrating financial literacy into mathematics courses. The objectives and outcomes in the mathematical curriculum of the country supporting the project were matched with the tasks designed within the project's scope, and they were distributed throughout grades 1-8. In addition, a guidebook that includes not only the tasks but also the other dimensions of the project has been prepared for teachers. In this way, we aim to guide teachers and keep the project moving along a healthy route. In-service training for teachers, student practices, and assessments are the main focuses of the implementation phase. In this way, we expect to present an idea about the integration of financial literacy into an educational system without modifying the curriculum by opening a way from theory to practice.
Future studies can discuss aspects of this research, such as common processes, task design parameters, and financial concepts. For instance, students' perceptions of a specific financial concept and how they change with age can be an interesting research topic. Besides, an analysis of the children's descriptions of financial concepts before and after a particular training tailored to their age levels can present productive data. In this regard, we anticipate that studies regarding the interrelationship contribute not only to the financial field but also to mathematics education at all levels, including teacher education.