Eastern
College of Arts and
Sciences
NCSS/Social Studies
XI. Matrix
Matrix Item 2.4
Disciplinary Standard: Economics
Teachers who are
licensed to teach economics at all school levels should possess the knowledge,
capabilities, and dispositions to organize and provide instruction at the
appropriate school level for the study of economics.
Indicators of
Capabilities for Teaching Economics
Teachers of economics at all school levels should provide
developmentally appropriate experiences as they guide learners in their
study. They should assist learners in acquiring an understanding of the
following principles:
* Productive resources
are limited. Therefore, people cannot have all the goods and services
that they want; as a result, they must choose some things and give up others.
* Effective decision
making requires comparing the additional costs of alternatives with the
additional benefits. Most choices involve doing a little more or a little
less of something; few choices are all or nothing decisions.
* Different methods
can be used to allocate goods and services. People, acting individually
or collectively through government, must choose which methods to use to
allocate different kinds of goods and services.
* People respond predictably
to positive and negative incentives.
* Voluntary exchange
occurs only when all parties expect to gain. This is true for trade among
individuals or organizations within a nation, or among individuals or
organizations in different nations.
* When individuals,
regions, and nations specialize in what they can produce at the lowest cost and
then trade with others, both production and consumption increase.
* Markets exist when
buyers and sellers interact. This interaction determines market prices
and thereby allocates scarce goods and services.
* Prices send signals
and provide incentives to buyers and sellers. When supply and demand
change, market prices adjust, affecting incentives.
* Competition among
sellers lowers costs and prices, encouraging producers to produce more of what
consumers are willing and able to buy. Competition among buyers increases
prices and allocates goods and services to those people who are willing and
able to pay the most for them.
* Institutions evolve
in market economies to help individuals and groups accomplish their
goals. Banks, labor unions, corporations, legal systems, and
not-for-profit organizations are examples of important institutions. A
different kind of institution, clearly defined and enforced property rights, is
essential to a market economy.
* Money makes it
easier to trade, borrow, save, invest, and compare the value of goods and
services.
* Income for most
people is determined by the market value of the productive resources they
sell. What workers earn depends, primarily, on the market value of what
they produce and how productive they are.
* Entrepreneurs are
people who take the risks of organizing productive resources to make goods and
services. Profit is an important incentive that leads entrepreneurs to
accept the risks of business failure.
* Investment in
factories, machinery, new technology, and in health, education, and training of
people can raise future standards of living.
* There is an economic
role for government to play in a market economy whenever the benefits of a
government policy outweigh its costs. Governments often provide for
national defense, address environmental concerns, define and protect property
rights, and attempt to make markets more competitive. Most governments
also redistribute income.
* Costs of government
policies sometimes exceed benefits. This may occur because of incentives
facing voters, government officials, and the government employees; because of
actions by special interest groups that can impose costs on the general public;
or because social goals other than economic efficiency are being pursued.
* A nation’s overall
levels of income, employment, and prices are determined by the interaction of
spending and production decisions made by all households, firms, government
agencies, and others in the economy.
* Unemployment imposes
costs on individuals and nations. Unexpected inflation imposes costs on
many people and benefits some others because it arbitrarily redistributes
purchasing power. Inflation can reduce the rate of growth of national
living standards because individuals and organizations use resources to protect
themselves against the uncertainty of future prices.
* In the
2.4 Economics
The program prepares
Social Studies teachers who possess the knowledge, capabilities and
dispositions to organize and provide instruction at the appropriate school level
for the study of Economics.
All students in the economics program complete 30 credits in
economics courses, plus at least one college level math class, for a total of
33 credits. These include required coursework in economic theory and
statistical methods, and electives in economics applications. In addition
all students complete a class in Social Studies teaching methods, HIST 481, in which their lesson
preparation instruction focuses on economics content.
Students meet the theme for the discipline of economics in 5
required classes, and through their choice of five elective classes.
I. Required Courses:
ECON 201, Principles of Economics I
ECON 202, Principles of Economics II.
ECON 301, Intermediate Macroeconomics
ECON 302, Intermediate Microeconomics
ECON 310, Economics Statistics
II. Elective Courses:
(Courses typically selected by education students)
ECON 300, Contemporary
Economic Issues
ECON 340, Money and Banking
ECON 328, Economics of Women
ECON 375,
ECON 385, Economic Development
ECON 480, International
Economics
These classes meet NCSS standards in the following ways:
ECON 201 has the following
course goals and objectives for all instructors:
1. The course introduces students to basic macroeconomic
concepts and tools of analysis. Important among the tools are various economic
models. Additionally, it should help students better understand and critically
evaluate national macroeconomic policy.
2. Define basic economic concepts and illustrate their use.
3. Identify, illustrate, and provide practice in the use of
basic macroeconomic models. Elementary algebra is used. Among models explored
are:
a) The production possibilities frontier,
b) The market
c) The Keynesian model of national income determination
d) Aggregate expenditure
e) Multiplier
f) Aggregate Supply-Aggregate demand
g) The creation of money
h) The money market
i) Monetarism
j) International economic relations
4. Indicate differences of opinion within economics about
using models.
5. Identify:
a) Macroeconomic policy goals of the government
b) Methods of achieving those goals, and
c) Differences of opinion about appropriate goals and policy
6. Apply economic concepts and models to better understand
selected current events.
ECON 202 has the following
goals and objectives:
1. To introduce students to basic microeconomic concepts and tools
of analysis.
2. Students will learn a set of concepts, which comprise a
valuable kit of analytical tools to understand, predict and forecast individual
decision behavior.
3. The individual decision-making units studied are consumers,
producers, and resource owners.
4. The course also introduces students to the interaction of these
agents in a market setting, and the social outcomes of these interactions.
ECON 301 has the following
goals and objectives:
1. To examine macroeconomic measurement, and macroeconomic
problems and goals.
2. Study the Classical models of full-employment and variable
price macroeconomics and money.
3. Explain the Keynesian models of variable output,
unemployment, and sticky prices.
4. Understand the role of fiscal and monetary policy in the
Keynesian and Classical models: The IS-LM, AS-AD framework.
5. To learn Keynesian and Classical views of trade-offs
between inflation and unemployment: the Phillips Curve.
6. Understanding the new directions in the search to explain
macroeconomic behavior will be studied.
7. Analysis of theory of practice in using monetary and
fiscal policies to achieve macroeconomic goals.
8. Closer looks at international economics, economic growth,
consumption and investment, and money market.
9. Applying theory to analyze current and perspective
macroeconomic performance and policies.
ECON 302 has the following
goals and objectives:
1. Students will be able to describe and analyze the
competitive economic market.
2. Students will be able to describe and analyze the consumer
model, in particular utility functions and indifference curves, budget constraints,
factors influencing the demand for commodities, factors influencing the supply
of labor and other inputs.
3. Students will be able to describe and apply the
theory of the firm, in particular production, costs of production, product
supply and input demand.
4. Students will be able to describe market structures; in
addition to the competitive market the following are explored: monopolistic
markets, oligopolistic markets, and monopolistic competition.
5. Students will be familiar with Game theory.
6. Students will be able to describe and analyze efficiency
and equity as goals regulating the evaluation of policy in market economies.
ECON 310 has the following
goals and objectives: Students will be able to describe, apply and analyze the
following:
1. Descriptive statistics: frequency tables and graphs,
center of a distribution, spread of a distribution, statistics by computer,
linear transformations.
2. Probability: probability models, compound events,
conditional probability, independence, Bayes Theorem.
3. Probability Distribution: discrete random variables, mean
and variance, the Binomial distributions, the
4. Two Random Variables: Distributions, function of two
random variables, covariance, linear combination of two random variables.
5. Sampling: random sampling, moments of the sample mean, the
shape of the sampling distribution, proportion distributions.
6. Confidence Intervals: simple mean, small-sample,
difference in two means (independence samples), difference in two means
(matched samples), proportions.
7. Hypothesis Testing: Classical test, P-value, B-error.
8. Linear Regression: fitting a line, simple regression,
multiple regression.
2.4.2 Test Evidence
Class evidence:
No student majoring in economics for education was in the Winter 2003 student teaching cohort.
Majors in Economics have passed the Michigan Test for Teacher
Certification at a rate of 93% over the past four years. The state-wide average
has been 75% during this period.
MTTC Objectives for
each subject test are listed in the
Appendix.
2.4.3 Performance
Evidence
No student majoring in economics for education was in the Winter 2003 student teaching cohort.