‘Slave trading’ lesson was meant to teach students about market prices. It backfired.

A Missouri school principal apologized after one of his teachers gave fifth-graders at Blades Elementary an assignment about slave trading, Fox 6 Now reported.

“Set your price for a slave,” the assignment reads. “These could be worth a lot.”

In a statement to parents, principal Jeremy Booker apologized to parents after becoming aware of the assignment given to students in a social studies course.

“The assignment, which was completed during class time, attempted to address market practices. ... Students were learning about having goods, needing goods and obtaining goods and how that influenced early settlement in America. Some students who participated in this assignment were prompted to consider how plantation owners traded for goods and slaves,” Booker said in an email to the McClatchy News Group.

The assignment was “culturally insensitive,” Booker said, who met with the teacher to discuss the assignment, their “interpretation of curriculum standards, and the impact the activity could have on students,” he said in the email.

Booker said the teacher expressed “significant remorse.”

He said he would work with the Mehlville school district to “provide all Blades teachers and staff with professional development on cultural bias in the near future,” he said.

A “spokesperson said the teacher who created the assignment has been placed on administrative leave,” KSDK 5 reported.