Teaching Economics outside (2)

Here is another idea for getting your classes outside (if you are allowed) on a nice sunny day. All you need is some large sticks of colourful chalk, available from most stationery / paper supplies stores. Then get the students to work on drawing some oversize graphs!

Finding some concrete around the school shouldn’t be a problem and I usually get the students to work in pairs or threes. Competition graphs tend to be the most suitable as you can get each group to do something a bit different, for example perfect competition with 3 different types of profit. The guideline I give them is that the total graph should be about the size of a medium sized car.

The students love doing it and I suspect they like the fact that their friends who don’t do economics will see them but don’t have any idea what they mean. The graphs will last until the next time it rains but if you suspect someone is going to kick up a fuss then finding an out of the way area might be a good idea.

A further idea (one I haven’t tried yet) is to incorporate it into a treasure hunt. Each group has to do their graph within a defined area of the school. One idea is that each graph has to show a monopoly supernormal profit of an amount that they choose. Then they have to find the graphs of the other groups and work out the level of supernormal profit. First group back wins and if they find any mistakes in their fellow students graphs then that group is disqualified. You could also get someone to go around with a digital camera / phone to snap all of the graphs and then discuss them when you are all back together in class.

Enjoy!