Grocery Store Dramatic Play

I introduced L and E (3 years old) to money recently.  They already knew the concept of money (taking it to the bank, buying stuff, etc..), but were not familiar with the coins and their values.  I promised them that they could use their plastic play money to play 'Grocery Store', so that is the first thing they asked for the next morning, even before breakfast.  It was really simple to set up, and they've been requesting the 'Grocery Store Game' all week...

I put out some trays and asked the girls to help me sort their play food for the grocery store.  Then I gave them some boxes to push around for 'shopping carts'.  L reminded me that her babies (bears) have to sit in the shopping cart and be good helpers.  Then she proceeded to wipe down her cart with a 'disinfectant wipe' (just like Mommy!).  L did most of the shopping while E sat by the cash register (a toy I picked up after Christmas at Target for $1):

After L selected what she wanted to buy, she took her groceries to the register and counted them out to see how much money it would cost.  She wanted to do one-to-one correspondence between the items and coins (10 items = 10 coins), and didn't respond when I tried to show her that items cost different amounts and coins represented different values (I'll try another time - at least she practiced her counting).  E enjoyed collecting the money and putting it into her register:

We all enjoyed this dramatic play experience, and it was a delight watching my kids reenact something that they see their parents do so frequently and engage with each other so nicely.