Farmers sell crops that they grow. Pretend you are a farmer. On a sheet of paper list two crops you would like to grow on your farm.
Oh no! You only have land to grow one crop. You have to make a choice. Circle the crop you would like to grow most. The crop you didn’t choose to grow is your opportunity cost. Put a line through that crop.
In this lesson you will recognize that farmers can’t grow everything they might want to grow; they must choose which crops to grow. You will also discover that the crop that is not grown is the opportunity cost.
Now turn your paper over and draw a picture of your farm with the one crop you circled growing in a garden.
Click on the link
to find a picture painted by a famous painter named Vincent van Gogh.
This link shows a farmer on his farm in Holland. He is growing a special crop on his farm.
||Vincent van Gogh's Flower Beds in Holland|
Once you have had a chance to look at the painting, take this short quiz to test your knowledge.
Farmers have only so much land. Therefore, they cannot grow everything they might want to grow.
Because they can't grow everything, farmers must choose to grow the crops that will suit them best. When farmers choose to grow one crop, they cannot grow another.
The crop they did not choose to grow is their opportunity cost.
Click on the link to see the picture painted by Vincent van Gogh again. This farmer could have grown only blue flowers. He made a choice between growing only blue flowers and growing flowers of many different colors. What did he choose? What was his opportunity cost?