In Alejandra Solis' 10-year-old imagination, a plastic coffee mug turned into a big bucket of money.

Best of all, Alejandra said, her bucket could be had for free.

Another student in the exercise that combined acting with economics decided that a roll of tape would be a large gold band, shiny and heavy, that cost 1 cent.

"We're going to have to work on these price points," said Kevin Ehrhart, an actor and a director at the Rose Theater who was helping Jill Melkus' fourth-grade class last week at Crestridge Magnet Center.

With a $1,200 grant from the Nebraska Arts Council and $1,800 from the National Council on Economic Education, Crestridge kindergarten through sixth-grade students are writing and performing marketing skits for key products from countries they are studying. Students also are making posters to highlight each country's population, natural resources and other facts.

Combining fine arts with economics might not seem like a logical marriage of disciplines. However, applying motor and sensory skills to an academic setting helps children learn, particularly those who find it difficult to read or sit quietly listening to lectures, school and other officials said.

"Applying a physical memory to a cerebral activity boosts and imbeds the material," Ehrhart said. "You're inviting the facts into more areas of the brain, and it sticks."

Or in 10-year-old Samantha Nelsen's words, "It's fun because it's cool learning about other stuff."

The project began just before Thanksgiving and runs through Feb. 5, when each class will perform a skit at a school assembly.

Melkus' fourth-graders are preparing a sketch on China's textiles. Another class plans to dress as Argentinian gauchos, or cowboys, hoping to sell beef to President Bush.

It is not the first "arts combined with economics" lesson at the magnet school.

In 2004, students made sculptures showing the kind of personal wealth to which people in different nations have access, said John Mezger, Crestridge's magnet coordinator.

In 2005, students created mosaics to demonstrate the wealth of entire countries as the children tried to understand what makes some countries rich and other countries poor. Last year, students performed dances set to folk tales as they studied scarcity of resources in many nations.

Magnet schools in the Omaha Public Schools system use special curriculums to draw students from a number of neighborhoods. They take on major projects that vary depending on the schools' emphasis, such as visual and performing arts or mathematics and economics, Mezger said.

"This is some of the added value you get by attending a magnet school," Mezger said.

The University of Nebraska at Omaha's Center for Economic Education, which uses workshops and training materials to help improve economic literacy of teachers and students in Nebraska and western Iowa, is affiliated with the National Council on Economic Education and the Nebraska Council. It helped Crestridge obtain the grant from the national organization.

UNO's center also has close ties to two Omaha Public Schools magnet centers that stress economics: Conestoga and Marrs.

Combining arts and economics can help students translate what they learn, said James Dick, a professor of education at UNO and co-director of UNO's Center for Economic Education.

"It's another way for kids to demonstrate their understanding of the concepts, besides paper and pencil tests," Dick said. "It may be more powerful than a paper and pencil test."