Tenth Grade Economics
Fundamentals of Economics
EC1001
Tenth Grade: Economics
Unit 1: Fundamentals of Economics
Big Picture Graphic
Overarching Question:
How does scarcity impact the decisions individuals, organizations, and societies must make?
Previous Unit:
United States History and
Geography
This Unit:
Fundamentals of Economics
Next Unit:
Microeconomic
Challenges
Questions To Focus Assessment and Instruction:
Types of Thinking
1. How does scarcity impact the decisions individuals and
societies must make?
2. What roles do individuals and businesses play in an economic
system?
3. How do individuals evaluate their economic system?
Cause and Effect
Problem Solving
Identifying Perspectives
Compare and Contrast
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Tenth Grade Economics
Fundamentals of Economics
EC1001
Unit Abstract:
This introductory unit presents students with the fundamental economic problem of scarcity and
how people and societies respond. Building upon students’ prior knowledge and experiences with
economics, students begin by exploring the scope and methodology of economics as a social
studies discipline. Through case studies and scenarios, students apply cost/benefit analyses to
identify the opportunity costs involved in making a decision and apply marginal analysis to
personal decision making. In doing so, students consider how economic decisions are made “at
the margins”. Next, students advance to a more sophisticated view of the circular flow model
assessing how limited resources are allocated and move in the production and consumption of
goods and services in a market economy. Using a variety of scenarios, students evaluate factors
that might serve to increase and decrease the speed of the circular flow. Students then
concentrate on one aspect of the circular flow – businesses. They explore the advantages and
disadvantages of different business structures and examine some common characteristics of
several successful entrepreneurs. Next, students take a macroeconomic perspective and
investigate several ways in which societies have addressed the problem of scarcity. The unit
concludes with students applying the production possibilities model to consider ways in which an
economy can grow beyond its current level of production.
Focus Questions
1. How does scarcity impact the decisions individuals and societies must make?
2. What roles do individuals and businesses play in an economic system?
3. How do individuals evaluate their economic system?
Content Expectations
E1.1.1: Scarcity, Choice, Opportunity Costs, and Comparative Advantage – Using examples,
explain how scarcity, choice, opportunity costs affect decisions that households,
businesses, and governments make in the market place and explain how comparative
advantage creates gains from trade.1
E1.1.2:
Entrepreneurship – Identify the risks, returns and other characteristics of
entrepreneurship that bear on its attractiveness as a career.
E1.2.1:
Business Structures – Compare and contrast the functions and constraints facing
economic institutions including small and large businesses, labor unions, banks, and
households.2
E1.2.2:
Price in the Market – Analyze how prices send signals and provide incentives to buyers
and sellers in a competitive market.
1
The comparative advantage portion of this expectation is not addressed in this unit but will be addressed later in the
course in the unit entitled “The Global Economy”.
2
The banking portion of this expectation will be addressed in a subsequent unit “Role of the Government in the
Domestic Economy.”
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Tenth Grade Economics
Fundamentals of Economics
EC1001
E1.2.3:
Investment, Productivity and Growth – Analyze the role investments in physical (e.g.,
technology) and human capital (e.g., education) play in increasing productivity and how
these influence the market.3
E1.4.1:
Public Policy and the Market – Analyze the impact of a change in public policy (such as
an increase in the minimum wage, a new tax policy, or a change in interest rates) on
consumers, producers, workers, savers, and investors.
E3.1.1:
Major Economic Systems – Give examples of and analyze the strengths and
weaknesses of major economic systems (command, market and mixed), including their
philosophical and historical foundations (e.g., Marx and the Communist Manifesto, Adam
Smith and the Wealth of Nations).
E3.1.5:
Comparing Economic Systems – Using the three basic economic questions (e.g., what
to produce, how to produce, and for whom to produce), compare and contrast a socialist
(command) economy (such as North Korea or Cuba) with the Capitalist as a mixed, free
market system of the United States.
E4.1.1:
Scarcity and Opportunity Costs – Apply concepts of scarcity an opportunity costs to
personal financial decision making.
E4.1.5:
Personal Decisions – Use a decision-making model (e.g., stating a problem, listing
alternatives, establishing criteria, weighing options, making the decision, and evaluating
the result) to evaluate the different aspects of personal finance including careers,
savings and investing tools, and different forms of income generation.
Key Concepts
business structures
capital goods
choice
circular flow model
consumer goods
economic systems
economic efficiency
entrepreneurship
marginal analysis
opportunity cost
Production Possibilities Frontier / Curve
resources
scarcity
3
This expectation could be touched upon in connection with entrepreneurship (education to make oneself more
successful or earn a greater salary or wage). Additionally, one of the advantages to corporations is the ability to raise
capital to invest in technology and the role of financial institutions and labor unions also serve to improve productivity.
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Tenth Grade Economics
Fundamentals of Economics
EC1001
Duration
2 weeks
Lesson Sequence
Lesson 1: What is Economics?
Lesson 2: The Issue of Scarcity
Lesson 3: Choice and Opportunity Cost
Lesson 4: Circular Flow
Lesson 5: Business Structures
Lesson 6: Societal Responses to Scarcity
Lesson 7: Production Possibilities and Growth
Assessment
Selected Response Items
Constructed Response Items
Performance Assessments
E3.1.1; E3.1.5
Economic Continuum Draw a horizontal line. Label the left side of the
line “Pure Market Economy” and the right side, “Pure Centrally Planned
Economy.” Place each of the following nations on your line at a place
that you think accurately represents the current state of its economy:
United States, China, North Korea, Sweden, Great Britain, Russia,
Mexico, Cuba, Iran, South Africa, and Kenya.
Resources
Equipment/Manipulative
Bead containers (four)
Beads, different colors of red, green, blue and yellow to fill each bowl
Chart paper
Computers with Internet Access
Document Camera, Overhead Projector, or Computer Projector
Highlighters
Lined paper
Markers
Play money, in denominations of $1, $5, $10, and $20 (see Supplemental Materials (Unit 1))
Rules, about 15
Scissors, about 15 pairs
Student Notebook or Journal for the Perspectives in Scarcity Notebook
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Tenth Grade Economics
Fundamentals of Economics
EC1001
Unlined drawing or construction paper
Student Resource
Adams, Barbara Johnston. Go-around Dollar. New York: Four Winds, Maxwell Macmillan Canada,
Maxwell Macmillan International, 1992.
Circular Flow Diagram. 20 August 2009
.<http://legacy.lclark.edu/~bekar/Mankiw/ch22/image/mod22nf1.gif>.
Circular Flow of Income. Fundamentals of Business. 20 August 2009. <http://www.historysociety.com/circular-flow.html>.
Daily Lecture Notes for Glencoe "Economics Principles & Practices.” New York: Glencoe McGrawHill, 2004.
“Daredevil Urges Payton to Head South for Liver Transplant.” CNN/SI - NFL Football. Knievel has
advice for Walter Payton. 9 Feb. 1999. 20 August 2009
.<http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/football/nfl/news/1999/02/09/payton_kneivel/>.
DeLong, J. Bradford. “The Circular Flow.” Flows of Incomes, Expenditures, Factors of Production,
and Goods and Services. University of California at Berkeley. 20 August 2009.
<http://econ161.berkeley.edu/multimedia/circular3.html>.
A Hunger for Economic Knowledge. Enrichment Activities for Glencoe "Economics Principles &
Practices" New York: Glencoe McGraw-Hill, 2004.
Marginal Analysis. School of Economic Sciences. 20 August 2009.
<http://www.ses.wsu.edu/People/faculty/rosenman/dist301/Margin.htm>.
“Payton’s Liver Disease Progressing Faster than Expected.” CNN/SI - NFL Football - Payton's
disease progressing faster than expected. 13 Feb. 1999. 20 August 2009.
<http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/football/nfl/news/1999/02/12/payton_health/>.
“Rationing Transplants: An Ethical Problem." EconEdLink. 20 August 2009.
<http://www.econedlink.org/lessons/index.php?lesson=132&page=teacher >.
Ripp, Ken. Bead Game Simulation. Foundation for Teaching Economics. Davis, CA. 2001.
http://www.fte.org/teachers/lessons/lessons.htm .
Serchuk, David. “Beating the Opportunity Cost Blues.” Forbes.com. 9 July 2009. 22 August 2009.
<http://www.forbes.com/2009/07/08/opportunity-costs-market-timing-intelligent-investingindexing.html>.
Teacher Resource
Junior Achievement Text and Study Guide
NCEE
Michigan Citizenship Collaborative Curriculum
www.micitizenshipcurriculum.org
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Tenth Grade Economics
Fundamentals of Economics
EC1001
Contemporary Economics, McConnell & Brue, p. 33-34, Ch. 2
Money Instructor, Play Money. 22 August 2009. <http://www.moneyinstructor.com/play.asp>
Schenk, Robert E. The Circular Flow. 22 August 2009.
<http://ingrimayne.com/econ/TheFirm/CircularFlow.html>.
Resources for Further Professional Knowledge (Summer Reading List for Teachers)
Ariely, Dan. Predictably Irrational: The Hidden Forces That Shape Our Decisions. New York:
HarperCollins, 2009.
Freedman, Thomas L. The World Is Flat: A Brief History of the Twenty-first Century. New York:
Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 2005.
Levitt, Steven D. and Stephen L. Dubner. Freakanomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden
Side of Everything. New York: HarperCollins, 2005
Miller, Roger LeRoy, Daniel K. Benjamin, and Douglass C. North. Economics of Public Issues, The
(15th Edition). New York: Addison Wesley, 2007.
Michigan Citizenship Collaborative Curriculum
www.micitizenshipcurriculum.org
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