Florida SS.8.FL.5.3
The Standard
- SS.8.FL.5
- Identify and analyze the means, types and risks of financial investing including personal and societal influences and the government’s role in regulating investments.
Discuss that when people buy corporate stock, they are purchasing ownership shares in a business that if the business is profitable, they will expect to receive income in the form of dividends and/or from the increase in the stock’s value, that the increase in the value of an asset (like a stock) is called a capital gain, and if the business is not profitable, investors could lose the money they have invested.
Florida Next Generation Sunshine State Standards for Social Studies
Teacher's field guide
What This Standard Means
What Students Need to Do
- Students explain that buying stock gives an investor partial ownership in a company. They distinguish dividend income from a capital gain and explain how an investor can lose money.
What Mastery Looks Like
- Students can analyze a stock scenario and identify the investor’s ownership, dividend income, capital gain, or loss. They explain that dividends and rising stock prices are not guaranteed.
Common Misconceptions
- Students may think buying stock is the same as lending money to a company. They may also assume profitable companies always pay dividends or that stock prices always rise when a company earns a profit.
How to Assess It
- Ask: Maya buys 10 shares at $20, receives a $0.50 dividend per share, then sells at $24. Have students calculate her dividend income and capital gain, then name one possible risk.
Lesson moves
Ways to Teach It
Give groups paper company shares, dividend tokens, and event cards showing price increases, price drops, profits, and losses.
Have students write: Would you rather earn dividends or wait for a stock price increase, and what risk comes with your choice?
Run a card sort where students label examples as ownership, dividend, capital gain, or investment loss.
Use a public company’s one-year stock chart and dividend history to calculate what could have happened to a $500 investment.
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Related Standards
- SS.4.FL.5.2
Explain that a financial investment is the purchase of a financial asset, such as a stock, with the expectation of an increase in the value of the asset and/or ...
- SS.8.FL.1.7
Identify that interest, dividends, and capital appreciation (gains) are forms of income earned from financial investments.
- SS.4.FL.5
Financial Investing
- SS.4.FL.1.6
Describe ways that people who own a business can earn a profit, which is a source of income.
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