Basic Economics

Spring 2011
Mrs. Stoudt
Room: 117
E-mail: rstoudt@marianhs.org
Website: www.freewebs.com/mrsstoudt/
Available Periods: 3rd, 7/8th , 9th as well as before and after school

Course Objective: This course is designed to give you a basic understanding of

Economic concepts. We will explore the ideas of supply and demand, the workings of
the firm, factors of production, and efficiency. Together we will look at applications of
these concepts to real world scenarios. In this class you are expected to take an active
role in discussions and activities and keep up on daily assignments in order to receive the
full worth of this course.

Grading: We shall follow the Marian grading scale:

93-100% A
85-92% B
77-84% C
70-76% D
69- F

Cheating will not be tolerated. This includes copying other students work as
well as copying and pasting off the Internet. Any cheating will result in a zero for
the assignment and no opportunity to make up the points. Please see the Marian
student handbook for an outline of the consequences of cheating.

Course Outline: Your grade will consist of homework, in-class assignments, quizzes,
tests, and notebook grades. In order to help reinforce economic topics and to ensure that
you understand the material we will have a specific order to the way we approach each
chapter. Each chapter has 3 sections to it; after we learn the material in the first section
you will be given homework to reinforce it and then a quiz the following day over the
material. The same thing will happen following the second section (homework and then
quiz) and then after the third section you will have homework and then jeopardy the
following day to review the entire chapter. All of the section quizzes will be short 10-12
point quizzes that may be corrected in class. Following jeopardy at the end of each
chapter you will have a test (approximately 50 points) over that chapter.
Class activities and notes are designed to assist you in learning the economic
concepts at hand and therefore are required. Your notebook will be collected at the end
of each chapter and you will be given points for having all the materials for that chapter
including warm-ups, notes, charts, graphs, and in class worksheets. When absent you
must be sure to get all missed materials for your notebook as well as any assignments. I
will allow for only 1 missed warm-up per chapter, so you must make this up as well.
Finally you will be required to work in a group with other students (to be selected
later by me) to invest in and keep track of stocks of your choosing in the Indiana Stock
Market Game. Each individual in the group will have a set job and the group as a whole
will be given instructions on how the ten week project will be graded. Details will come
later as we get closer to the start of the competition.
It is important that you keep up to date on missing assignments due to absences or
late work because it WILL NOT be accepted after the quiz/test over that chapter
Absences/Make-up Work: I would appreciate notification of known absences as soon as
possible so that you may be given work ahead of time if possible. For make-up work there is a
calendar page on my website (you can access this by going to the Economics page and clicking
on “Economics Calendar”. This calendar includes due dates of assignments, tests, quizzes, and
absent sheets. The absent sheet will list all activities missed, any reminders mentioned during
class, and any homework. Each student will have 2 days for every day they were absent to finish
make-up work or it will be a zero. IT IS THE STUDENT’S RESPONSIBILITY TO CHECK
THE ABSENT BOX ONCE THEY RETURN TO SCHOOL! You may either check the website
at home or use the computer in class closest to the printer to view and print a personal copy for
yourself. Please make sure your read through the absent sheet carefully as you are responsible for
all missed work.

Late work: All assignments must be turned in at the beginning of class on the day in
which they are due. For every day late 10% will be deducted from the final grade. Work
will not be accepted at all after the test on that particular subject.

Tardiness: As you are all Seniors I expect you to be responsible enough to take care of
your business within passing time in-between classes. I plan for the allotted time for each
period and therefore expect that you be in your seats when the bell rings. I do keep track
of tardies and will issue a 15 minute detention after three tardies and will add 15 minutes
for each additional tardy so don’t be late! This of course excludes excused tardies.

Website: My website address is www.freewebs.com/mrsstoudt/ and here you can access all
handouts, links to articles given in class, absent sheets and more. I encourage you to become
familiar with it! You can also access it through the Marian website if you go to “Faculty/Staff”
on the left side of the home page and then scroll down to Mrs. Stoudt and click on Social Studies.
You will need to become a member of my website so that you can view videos posted and post
comments and questions to the discussion forum. To become a member of my site (please
become a member by Friday, January 7th):
1) Go to my website and click on “Guestbook”
2) Click on “Register” and fill in the information
3) You will then need to access your e-mail to confirm that you want to join
(you will not be a member until you do this!)
4) It will then take you back to my website where you can put in a profile
picture (if you want, school appropriate) and answer a couple of questions.
5) Now any time you go to a page that requires you to login (not all pages do)
you will need to remember the e-mail address you used and password.

Materials Needed:
Notebook Pencil/pen Folder
Text: Economics Today and Tomorrow

I hope we have a great year together and look forward to getting to know all of
you. Please know that I am open to discussion about problems and/or questions you
have.