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Investing ActivitiesReading Stock ReportsPurpose: Students learn to read the stock pages in the Wall Street Journal. Materials: Wall Street Journal 1 per student (or 1 per 2 students) Highlighters 1 per student Instructions: Ask students if they ever wished they owned a big company like McDonald’s, Nike, Gap, or Ford. Point out that they can become a part-owner of any of these companies by buying one share of stock.Ask students to find Section C of the Wall Street Journal. This section is called "Money & Investing." It contains a few articles about the stock market, profiles of specific companies, and other financial data. The major feature of Section C is the listings of the publicly traded companies on the major stock exchanges. Ask students to find the listings for the New York Stock Exchange. The column labeled "stock" is where all the companies are listed in alphabetical order. Notice that many company names are abbreviated. Pick a letter on the first page (A, B, or C). Instruct students to search under that letter and highlight all the names of companies they recognize. After a few minutes, have students count how many stocks they recognized. Allow them to call out some of the names of stocks they marked. Point out that each stock has a distinctive trading symbol (see column labeled "sym"). Have students tell the trading symbols of their favorite companies. Now have students look for two columns labeled "Hi" and "Lo" with the words "52 weeks" above them. These columns tell the highest price and the lowest price the stock sold for during the past year. Next, look for two columns on the right labeled "Hi" and "Lo." These columns tell the highest price and the lowest price the stock sold for that day. The column labeled "Close" tells the price of the stock when the stock market closed that day. The column labeled "Net Chg" tells how much the closing price changed from the previous day’s closing price. Ask students to list five stocks that closed higher than the previous day. Ask students to list five stocks that closed lower than the previous day. How do you make money in the stock market? Most investors make money in the stock market by buying stock, holding it until the price goes up, and selling the stock. Investors also make money if the stock they own pays dividends. Look for the column labeled "Div." This column tells the number of dollars per share the company is currently paying in dividends. These dividends are usually paid every three months. Now direct students to study the stocks in the New York Stock Exchange and choose three stocks they believe are good investments. Tell students to put a star by the stocks they choose. Have students track the performance of these three stocks for several weeks and chart the price fluctuations. Back to Teacher TrekRevised: March 02, 2005. |