"But when are you going to get to the economics?"
It was the end of my first day volunteering to teach "basic economics" to a group of fifth graders. The teacher looked bemused as she asked the question.
"That's what I'm doing," I whispered a little curtly in reply.
Realizing her offense, she quickly explained her meaning: "You know, with all the graphs and big words and stuff."
I realized this teacher was under the common misperception (perpetuated by most economics professors) that economics is about math, models, and strange lands where a complete lack of real competition is called "perfect competition" and it is possible to visualize (and measure) human happiness using "utility curves."
But I had no intention of subjecting these students to economics of this sort. My goal was far more ambitious. I wanted to show them that economics stems from ordinary human behavior in the real world we face every day. So here is what we did.
My approach was painfully modest. I simply introduced the students to one economic concept per week.
A little something to help the NDP over the next month or so... Read it all.
BTW - it also helps those in the OccupyPlaces movement... at least I think it might...
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