Economics Standard Four - Grades 6-8

Sample Activity

After examining the Chinese and Japanese restrictions on external trade in the 18th and 19th centuries, students might suggest consequences anticipated by the rules of these countries if advanced technological products were allowed free access into the country [International trade].

Students might identify the major deposits of natural resources in Africa and Asia which drew the attention of European explorers and traders in the 14th-18th centuries. They would then identify the products which European nations exchanged for those resources, and analyze how the exchange affected each trading partner in economic, political, and cultural terms [International trade].

This activity would integrate will with almost any regional study conceived to meet the history standard.

Working in groups, students could be assigned the roles of a ship owner, a distiller of rum, a female colonist and a plantation owner in the British West Indies. Each would give testimony before the Board of Trade and Plantations supporting his or her position on whether free trade should be established between the British colonies in America and the French West Indies [International trade].

This activity closely relates to History Standard Four.

to Economics Standard Four.