The Honeycomb – reinforcing connections between concepts in Economics

As a quick lesson starter, or revision tool the following activity is an excellent way to consolidate conceptual understandings. In my Economics class this year, I am exploring lots of different ways to developing deeper thinking and conceptual understandings and this was a really positive lesson. With the aid of a visual, the task asks …

Sorting, grouping and working with examples: Concept Formation in Economics

In beginning a new unit, teachers always look for prior knowledge and then attempt to build on these understandings. A wide range of research points to this as an essential way to make 'learning stick', by developing students mental schema and to help them hang new learning from existing frameworks. Activating prior knowledge In starting …

Exploring the options – touch enabled hybrid laptops

For the past few months I have been trialing a hybrid laptop/tablet PC from Hewlett Packard the EliteBook x360. As a school we have used Apple Laptops and iPads exclusively for the last seven years with much success, but over the last 12 months there has been a surge in touch enabled devices with styluses that …

Moving from examples to understanding an abstract concept

Through my lessons this year, I have been working on strategies to help my students to both identify and understand concepts more deeply. As Economics is founded on theories and interconnected abstract concepts, it is therefore a key pedagogy we teachers need to be proficient with. In the work of Lynn Erickson and other theorists, …

Yes, Quizlet got even better; now with diagrams

Quizlet remains as one of those Swiss Army knife style apps that you end up repurposing and going back to time and time again. Last year it got a significant revamp with the Quizlet Live game feature and now there is a clever addition called Quizlet Diagrams. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bFcov4KAvw The new diagrams tool goes further adding a …

When online learning amplifies the face-to-face classroom

Life as a High School teacher is a tricky balancing game. Conversation in the office revolves around the trade off between doing something in incredible depth through an engaging lesson or skimming over something quickly. This tradeoff comes about because as High School teachers we still feel that we are the best people to explain and …

Grappling with the concepts of the circular flow model

A really fundamental model in Economics is the concept of the circular flow and the basic economic system. We use this to help explain the main sectors of the economy and the flows of money between the different component parts. Overtime students come back to this model to help analyse government policy, the ideas of …

An Overview of the World Studies Extended Essay for IB and Economics

This week we were luckily enough to have a specific workshop on the World Studies Extended Essay option for students. Here are my notes, thoughts and some examples from the session and ideas on how it connects to Economics. This information reflects changes to Extended Essay in light of the new guide beginning for August 2016. …

Evolving Professional Learning

Over the past ten years I feel my practice as a teacher has changed beyond recognition. I have experimented, failed, tweaked, written, rephrased and reinvented nearly every aspect of my lessons with the goal of making the learning more effective for my students. Over the years I cannot point to one professional development event that …

IB Diploma Onscreen Assessment – stepping into the unknown

A year ago I spotted an interesting development for the International Baccalaureate programme tucked away in a blog post on their website. Substantial planning is underway for the migration of DP examinations from paper to on-screen. We are extremely excited about this important development for the IB. It means that exam papers will no longer be printed …