William B. Walstad - Böcker

Economics is taught in some form in the secondary schools of nations throughout the world. The subject is rarely taught in elementary schools, and while economics courses are offered in universities, the majority of students end their formal education with secondary school. Thus, the best opportunity for the economic education of the youth of a nation occurs in secondary schools. This book examines economic education at this critical level of the educational system. The teaching of economics in secondary schools varies across countries. These differences occur because of history, the structure of education, and other national factors. At the same time, there are common elements in the economic education of many countries, especially in content coverage. This contrast between the common features and the uniqueness of economic education in secondary schools of major industrial nations exemplifies the international perspective presented in this book. The international perspective is developed in the six sections of the volume. The first section discusses why nations should include economics in school curricula, and presents a framework for teaching economics that should have global appeal. Dissension and consensus on economic issues among North American and European economists are examined in the second section. The third section surveys the U.S. research literature on precollege economic education and assesses the current state of economics instruction in U.S. schools. The economics curricula and educational practices in seven other nations -- the U.K., Canada, Japan, Germany, Austria, Korea, and Australia -- are described in the fourth and fifth sections. The fifth section also presents international comparisons of economic understanding based on national testing in six of those nations. The sixth and final section explores the role of economic education in centrally planned economies, and its effects on the transition to a market economy, using Russia, Bulgaria, and China as case studies.

Teaching Innovations in Economics presents findings from the Teaching Innovations Program (TIP) funded by the National Science Foundation. The six-year project engaged economics professors in the use of interactive teaching in undergraduate economics courses. Each chapter offers an insightful explanation of an innovative teaching strategy and provides a description and examples of its effective use in undergraduate economics courses. The book’s conclusion assesses the results from an evaluation of the program that reports detailed findings on how TIP fundamentals have contributed to faculty development and successful outcomes. The first three chapters of the book describe the results of TIP’s three phases: (1) workshops on teaching for college and university economics instructors that introduced them to a variety of interactive teaching strategies; (2) follow-on instructional modules that provided mentoring from interactive strategy experts and gave participants an opportunity to adapt and apply these strategies to their undergraduate economics courses; and (3) opportunities to contribute to the scholarship of teaching and learning in economics, which involves sharing and discussing teaching innovations with other faculty members in presentations, papers, and other forums. The chapters following describe the seven interactive strategies featured in the project: cooperative learning, classroom experiments, interpretive discussion, formative assessment, context-rich problem solving, teaching with cases, and active learning in large-enrollment courses. These seven chapters were each written by a team of four economists, consisting of a strategy expert and three TIP participants who used the teaching strategy in their classrooms with students. Written by economists and for economists, this is a valuable resource for all undergraduate economics instructors who seek to enrich their teaching and engage their students in employing economics theory and practice in the classroom and beyond.

This comprehensive and impressive volume presents the first book-length, multi-country investigation of reform of economic education in transition economies. Authors from the West and from transition economies describe the major changes in economics content and instruction that occurred in schools and universities throughout nations in Eastern and Central Europe and the former Soviet Union from 1989 to 2000. Nine of the chapters discuss specific countries - Belarus, Bulgaria, Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Russia, and Ukraine. Other chapters describe reforms in the undergraduate economics curriculum at Moscow State University, Kiev State University, and Belarus State University. One chapter reports the findings from a five-nation study of the effect of economics programs to retrain teachers on the economic understanding of secondary students. Another chapter explains the important role of economic education in creating support for public policy reforms in a nation. The results from multi-national surveys of public attitudes toward economic reforms and the market economy are analyzed in one chapter. The book concludes with an insightful explanation of the major 'change agents' responsible for the reform of academic economics and the teaching of economics in the transition economies.Anyone interested in economic education, transition economies, or educational reform in schools and universities will find this book a unique and fascinating reading.

The Entrepreneur in Youth offers one of the most comprehensive assessments to date of African American, Latino, and white high school students' aspirations, knowledge, opinions and educational views related to entrepreneurship and philanthropy. A key strength is its longitudinal approach to analysis and interpretations, made possible by extensive surveys of over 11,000 respondents from high school youth and other groups, including adults and business owners. The key findings exhibit an extraordinarily high level of interest in entrepreneurship among youth as well as a strong desire to give back to their communities. However, they lack the knowledge and experience to achieve their aspirations.The book's major recommendations and guidelines include challenges to education and other policymakers to expand and enhance opportunities to access entrepreneurship education and early entrepreneurship mentoring shadowing experiences - especially for those who demand it the most: African Americans and Latinos. Meeting these challenges not only will contribute to economic growth and social reform initiatives but also will increase economic and social mobility and access to opportunity for a still largely untapped pool of future entrepreneurs.This book will appeal to academics in entrepreneurship, economics, business and education, as well as policymakers, educators and business leaders.

Teaching Innovations in Economics presents findings from the Teaching Innovations Program (TIP) funded by the National Science Foundation. The six-year project engaged economics professors in the use of interactive teaching in undergraduate economics courses. Each chapter offers an insightful explanation of an innovative teaching strategy and provides a description and examples of its effective use in undergraduate economics courses. The book’s conclusion assesses the results from an evaluation of the program that reports detailed findings on how TIP fundamentals have contributed to faculty development and successful outcomes. The first three chapters of the book describe the results of TIP’s three phases: (1) workshops on teaching for college and university economics instructors that introduced them to a variety of interactive teaching strategies; (2) follow-on instructional modules that provided mentoring from interactive strategy experts and gave participants an opportunity to adapt and apply these strategies to their undergraduate economics courses; and (3) opportunities to contribute to the scholarship of teaching and learning in economics, which involves sharing and discussing teaching innovations with other faculty members in presentations, papers, and other forums. The chapters following describe the seven interactive strategies featured in the project: cooperative learning, classroom experiments, interpretive discussion, formative assessment, context-rich problem solving, teaching with cases, and active learning in large-enrollment courses. These seven chapters were each written by a team of four economists, consisting of a strategy expert and three TIP participants who used the teaching strategy in their classrooms with students. Written by economists and for economists, this is a valuable resource for all undergraduate economics instructors who seek to enrich their teaching and engage their students in employing economics theory and practice in the classroom and beyond.