This teaching guide for grades 4-6 focuses on the 1999-2000 United States Mint 50 State Quarters Program, which includes new quarter designs for the following states: Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland, South Carolina, New Hampshire, and Virginia. The guide includes six lesson plans that fit easily…

This introductory lesson on teaching economics concepts contains sections on the following: purpose; objectives; time; materials needed; and step-by-step classroom procedures. The focus is on the economic problem of scarcity and opportunity costs. Attached is an original skit, "There's no such thing as a free lunch," and a chart that…

This lesson plan offers students the opportunity to participate in the three basic economic systems (market, command, and tradition). By working in each of the systems, students will internalize the fundamental values present in each system and will gain insights into the basic advantages and disadvantages of each system. The lesson plan provides…

This lesson plan features a classroom simulation that helps students understand a command economic system. The lesson plan states a purpose; gives student educational objectives; suggests a time duration for the activity; lists materials needed; and outlines a step-by-step teaching procedure. Instructions for a research and writing homework…

Conveying the "common language of humanity" is the whole purpose of human rights education. Concerned citizens need to understand and embrace the fundamental principles of human dignity and equality and accept the personal responsibility to defend the rights of all people. This handbook is intended to help people who care about human…

This brochure introduces Environmental Citizenship in Florida's Middle Schools, which is a school-wide exercise aimed at making middle school students more aware of the natural world around them and their effect on that world. As many school-study areas as possible are used to help students learn how the environment can affect all aspects of their…

Community studies and an urban focus are returning to the social studies. This digest reviews urban studies from a historical perspective. The first section discusses the value of studying cities, noting that city living is becoming fashionable again, and a movement called the New Urbanism has brought a new appreciation for the social, cultural,…

This economics education publication focuses on the U.S. stock market and the risk and uncertainty that an individual faces when investing in the market. The material explains that risk and uncertainty relate to the same underlying concept randomness. It defines and discusses both concepts and notes that although risk is quantifiable, uncertainty…

Youth courts spread rapidly around the country in the 1990s, sharing important goals with law-related education (LRE), including a strong potential to improve the citizenship skills of young people. Youth court is a general term describing courts that involve young people in the sentencing of their peers. This technical bulletin provides an…

According to the Law Related Education Act of 1978, Law-Related Education (LRE) can be defined as "education to equip nonlawyers with knowledge and skills pertaining to the law, the legal process, the legal system, and the fundamental principles and values on which these are based." LRE teaches essential concepts of democracy, including…

This teacher's guide accompanies the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) four episode videotape documentary about the U.S.-Mexican War (1846-1848). The documentary tells the story of a war that transformed a continent; and a war in which Mexico lost almost half of its national territory to the United States. The guide introduces the documentary's…

This collection of the National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS) presidential addresses seeks to provide a valuable window to the history of NCSS and the field of social studies. Following the "Introduction" (James J. Sheehan), addresses appear chronologically: 1936 "Social Sanity through the Social Studies" (R. O.…

Bringing mathematics and economics together to connect them in students' minds gives students very important skills they can use in their lives. This book is intended for high school mathematics teachers, with lessons designed to reinforce the mathematics concepts and processes taught by using examples from economics. The book consists of 15…

Social studies objectives for the 1971-1972 National Assessment and citizenship objectives for the 1969-1970 and 1974-1975 Assessments are outlined. (KM)

Items representing the conceptual and theoretical basis of MACOS and applied studies in the classroom offer a representative sample of accessible materials. (Author/KM)