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The teaching of economics at the Kindergarten-12 level has been highly researched and reported upon since the 1970’s and has primarily concentrated on curriculum, materials, enrollments, and effectiveness of teaching techniques. This paper summarizes two recent reviews of research, the results of the National Assessment of Educational Progress in Economics, and two recent national surveys. Taken together, the findings suggest that more students are taking high school economics than ever before, and that their performance is better than reported performance in other social studies fields. While adequate teacher training remains a stubborn problem, economics teachers appear to use somewhat more variety in their teaching than do their peers.

In-class societies such as the Mini-Society and Mini-Economy provide opportunities for teaching important lessons about choice, scarcity, and economic organization. Those lessons are multiplied when in-class societies meet each other for simulated international trade. We describe a Global Entrepreneurship Marketplace Fair (GEM Fair) for participating elementary and middle school students. The basics of in-class societies, the benefits of cross-society trade, and the administrative setup of an international marketplace are summarized. The limitations of a GEM Fair as also discussed, including large subsidies from parents, “end-of-the-world” effects near the end of a GEM Fair, and the tendency of a free GEM Fair market to produce too many snack food items (from a parent’s or teacher’s point of view).

Because economics is increasing in importance in the high school curriculum, it is critically important that it is taught well by well-trained teachers. We offer suggestions for teaching high school economics in the areas of content, methodology, materials, and professional development. We address what content to include, the use of textbooks and supplementary materials, and innovative approaches for teaching economics. The use of literature, film, music, and activity-based lessons are discussed. Teachers are encouraged to seek out professional development opportunities through the Council for Economic Education and networking opportunities through the Global Association of Teachers of Economics. Although teaching high school economics can be challenging, there are many helpful materials and resources available.

High school student achievement in economics has been predominantly characterized by low test scores, while secondary social studies preservice teachers have less formal training in economics than most other social studies disciplines. In this self-study, the instructional affordances and constraints of an experimental economics methods course are analyzed in terms of developing secondary social studies preservice and inservice teachers’ pedagogical content knowledge (PCK) in economics from both the instructor and pre and inservice teachers’ perspectives. Two course assignments appeared to most notably develop PCK in economics, the Analysis of Economic Events and the Active-Learning, Interdisciplinary Economic Lesson. Findings suggest interrelationships exist among common content knowledge, specialized content knowledge, and horizon content knowledge for teaching economics. Implications and instructional suggestions for social studies teacher education and professional development are discussed.

In this paper, we outline the rationale for developing the Survey of the Status of Social Studies (S4). The instrument contains items for analyzing the organizational structure, instructional decision-making, professional attitudes, and demographics of social studies teachers. Nationally-inclusive data generated from this survey analysis were used to examine the technical and theoretical validity of the instrument. Incorporating factor analysis, findings suggest constructs embedded within S4 related to social studies pedagogy, content emphases, and technology-use that reflect extant theory. As such, the S4 and accompanying nationwide data set offer social educators a valuable resource for fostering professional development and policy.

This project presents an opportunity for high school social studies teachers to infuse content on the federal budget, national debt, and budget deficit into civics-courses. The federal budget influences countries’ decisions about domestic and foreign policy, making the study of the topic a necessity for understanding economic interdependence, as well as active and engaged citizenship. The national debt plays an important role in efforts to balance competing interests concerning taxes, entitlement programs, and government spending. Social studies teachers have the opportunity to create connections between economic and public policies about the federal budget, national debt, budget deficit, and the content commonly taught in high school civics classes across the United States. Our two-day lesson, Examining the role of citizens in the U.S. budgetary process: A case study, can be infused into the civics curriculum to help high school students begin to understand the federal budget, national debt, and budget deficit. We model an inquiry-oriented approach for citizen participation about these topics in high school civics classes.

This chapter delves into the biopsychosocial reasons behind offending behaviour. It provides an overview of key theories from the biological, psychological and social perspectives in psychology and criminology. The discussion includes different viewpoints on why people offend, focusing on Compassion-Focused Therapy and positive psychology. It explores how these approaches contribute to our understanding of offending behaviour.

For many students, studying history is a boring and irrelevant endeavor. Traditional, teacher-centered teaching strategies contribute to this unfortunate reality. While the lecture method and textbook readings can and should be used in the teaching of history, these methods should not be used to the exclusion of student-centered, engaging strategies. One strategy which has been theorized to motivate and instruct students is the use of popular music in the classroom. The following paper examines the use of popular music in the history classroom and the various ways in which its use can engage, motivate, and instruct students. It is suggested that the use of popular music can serve to capture students’ attention, create a positive classroom atmosphere, introduce and illustrate a time and place, generate interest in history, and enhance students’ knowledge and understanding of history, specifically that of the Vietnam War and the era surrounding it.

In working with pre-service and beginning middle grades social studies teachers, the authors have found that those teachers often struggle to organize and sequence content in meaningful ways. Although many national and state curriculum writing bodies have provided organizational frameworks to guide teachers in designing instruction for middles grades social studies, those same bodies have failed to assist teachers in the task of sequencing instruction in ways that assure learning. This article provides a practical sequencing framework that assists middle grades social studies teachers in designing effective instructional units that connect and integrate all of the social studies disciplines.

To explore and examine cultural differences in the consumer attitudes toward social media.

Internet survey.

The influence of culture toward the consumer attitudes in social media may be less salient compared with other consumer behaviors.

This study is exploratory in nature.

To encourage managers to revisit the issue of globalization versus localization, particularly in the domain of social media.

This study is one of the first attempts in exploring cultural differences in the consumer behavior of social media.