ABSTRACT
In his 1982 book The Birth Order Book: Why You Are the Way You Are, Kevin Leman described middle children as feeling ignored in favor of their younger and older siblings. In many ways, economics suffers the middle-child malady within the school curriculum. Curriculum developers tend to create a plethora of economic content for high-school teachers and students, and there is a growing collection of economics lessons tied to children’s literature, but a gap remains in the middle-school curriculum. That leaves middle-school teachers who wish to include economic content with the difficult task of raising the elementary curriculum or lowering the high-school curriculum to the correct level. Middle-school teachers who desire to teach economic content have the (even more) difficult task of finding a spot in the curriculum to teach it. The middle-school curriculum is often loaded with core classes to prepare students with the content needed for high school and electives that enrich the middle-school experience. Working economic content into the required classes is likely the most effective and efficient way to introduce economic content in the middle-school years. This chapter describes the current status of economics in the middle school, suggests reasons and strategies for including economic content in history, geography, general social studies, and math courses during these years, and offers high-quality resources to accomplish the task.
