No Post in 20 Days?!?!?!

I've become horrible at posting the extra credit blog.  I get that.  And I apologize.  There are a number of reasons for it, but I'm not going to go into it here.

Instead, I'm going to give you a bunch of opportunities to get extra credit.  The rules have changed a little bit with this post.

You still need to read and discuss these posts with an adult.  But you may only do one of these a day.  (And you may only do one for the entirety of Fall Break.)  Sure, you may read more, but you'll only get credit for one.

Some of the things will have changed, since the posts are from previous years, but overall the content is the same.

In order to get credit, you need to write the current date, the date of the post, do whatever the post tells you to do, and have the adult you read it with sign signifying that you read and discussed that post with them.

Here are the posts:  Dealing with Economics:

• The Economy
• Supply, Demand, and GDP
• Economics
• Urbanization

Dealing with Human Capital:

• Human Capital
• Human Capital II
• Human and China
• Human Capital: People With Skills

Supply, Demand, and GDP

We're jumping around a little bit here - between culture, standard of living, and economics.  Maybe, just by reading that sentence you can see how those things all relate.  Standard of living is one of the ingredients of culture.  The economy is a fairly reliable indicator of standard of living.

Of course, a teacher can't just say "economy" and expect the kids to know what he's talking about.

Yesterday, we reviewed the 4 types of economies:

• Traditional
• Market
• Command
• Mixed

We discussed the common thread between them - they all deal with how things are made, sold or traded for, and bought.

We also looked at their differences.  A traditional economy is based off of necessity and availability.  A market economy is based off supply and demand.  In a command economy, the government dictates production, distribution, and consumption.

And of course, a mixed economy is a mix of the others.

For instance, here in the United States, we're primarily a market economy.  However, the government does tell us there are certain things we're not allowed to make.  Can you think of any?

So, although we're a market economy, we're at least partially a command economy as well.

We discussed supply and demand - the less you have of something people want, the greater the value.  To illustrate this point, I told students a couple stories about aluminum.  (Students, if you remember any of the stories, quickly retell them now.  ...If not, feel free to click this link.)

We'll be discussing the economy (and how it ties in with culture) for the next several days.  Often, we'll do this through the lens of The Hunger Games, which depicts each type of economy.

One of the last things we studied and learned about was GDP.  Yesterday, after the bellwork, we played a computer game organizing countries by GDP.  (One might argue we were also looking at the standard of living for each of those countries, but it's a little more complicated than that.)

You should check out the game, too.  In fact, students, to get extra credit today, challenge whoever it is you're reading this blog post with.  Let me know who wins.  Write it down on a scrap of paper, along with what they thought of the game.  Make sure your name, date, and hour are on it.  Turn it in tomorrow.

Here's the link.

The Economy

7th grade students are good about knowing the basics.  When it comes to the economy, they're able to tell me that it deals with jobs, and the government, and money... But that's about it.

We're studying different types of economies right now.  First we had to define what is meant by the economy.

We put this on the board:

After that, I added some more definitions.  It's easy for teachers to throw the lesson out there to the students and say, "HAVE AT IT!"  Sometimes though, the students don't get it.  Even when we think they should.  So, here's me breaking it down even further.

Yes.  I know.  I used the word "stuff" in my definition.  Please go easy on me.  The students told Mr. Ogle, and I'm already expecting to be reprimanded quite severely.

At any rate, we looked at the process:

And we noted how the process can either portray a good economy (as above) or a bad economy:

So far, I think the lessons have gone well.  We've actually incorporated some other stuff in here as well, such as types of economies: command, market, traditional, and mixed.  We've brought up urbanization and industrialization.

If you want the extra credit for reading and discussing this blog with an adult, explain the cycles pictured above to them.  Then tell them the difference between the types of economic systems - they're mentioned in the paragraph above this one.  Finally, answer any other questions they have.  When you're done discussing it, write two sentences from the discussion on a piece of paper and put it in the extra credit tray tomorrow.  Please have the adult you discussed the blog with sign the paper as well.