The Comcast and Time Warner merger was in the news today so I had the students read and article about it in USA Today. It was a little over their head (7th and 8th graders) and I told them so - they don't read too many business articles during their free reading time. The article had a nice graph showing the number of customers different cable companies or satellite companies had around the country. This graph alone led to some great discussion. The article gave some pros and cons to the merger from the perspective of the companies and the consumers. We ended up defining many economics terms in our notes (capitalism, communism, competition, monopoly, and specialization). They were interested in this! The discussion went all hour with great engagement from all - okay, most.
I really can't fathom trying to teach economics and civics without connecting the concepts to current events. The current events should lead the content. Teach them what is going on in the world and they will be interested. You can connect most everything in the curriculum to current events if you take the time to make the connections.
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