Economics · Week 1 · Scarcity, Choice, and Markets
Thinking Like an Economist
Students list the choices they already make with limited time and money and name the economist identity they bring into class.
- Students will
- Students explain how scarcity forces choices and identify the scarce resources and choices in a school week.
- SEL skill
- Name the value behind a choice about limited time
- What it looks like
- Students notice the values and strengths they bring to economic choices and name the curiosity that drives them.
- Content focus
- Thinking like an economist
- Format
- Think write pair share
Self-awareness
Self-awareness means noticing your own thoughts, values, and strengths and how they shape what you do. More self-awareness activities
What you get
A teacher guide with what to say, step by step, plus student pages and a supports page for students with diverse learning needs, including those with IEPs. Print or Project it, or assign it in Google Forms and Google Docs for Google Classroom. Your first 10 activities are free.
Standards
- 12.1.1: CA History Social Science Content Standard, Grade 12: Principles of Economics (standard 12.1, item 1)
- CA HSS Analysis Skill: CST4 Relate current events to the physical and human characteristics of places and regions. (Chronological and Spatial Thinking)
- C3 Framework (national): D2.Eco.1.9-12 Analyze how incentives influence choices that can lead to policies with different costs and benefits for different groups.
- Literacy in history: WHST.11-12.2 Write informative and explanatory texts, including the narration of historical events.
Fits these textbook chapters
- Econ Alive! The Power to Choose, Chapter 1: An Economic Way of Thinking
- Econ Alive! The Power to Choose, Chapter 2: Economic Decision Making
- Economics, Chapter 1: What Is Economics?
- Economics: Principles in Action, Chapter 1: What Is Economics?
Textbook names are used only to help you find activities that fit what you teach. RoseThread Connect is not affiliated with these publishers.
More self-awareness activities for Economics
- Why Jobs Pay Differently Self-awarenessUsing supply, demand, and productivity to explain differences in wages and mapping the skills students want to grow next.
- The Fed and Your Wallet Self-awarenessExplaining how the Federal Reserve influences interest rates and applying the idea of delayed reward to personal saving.
- Reading the Economy's Pulse Self-awarenessCalculating unemployment and inflation rates and comparing nominal with real data, then checking in on students' own emotional indicators.
Next: The Cost of Every Choice
RoseThread Connect activities are drafted with the help of AI and shaped by educators. Students never have to share anything personal. Our five SEL skills are informed by CASEL's SEL Framework; RoseThread Learning is not affiliated with or endorsed by CASEL.