Fun and Games with the Government Budget: Incorporating Active Learning, Critical Thinking and Diversity Awareness

Abstract

Creating complex thinkers amongst a student body with developing critical thinking skills require strategies that help the student hold diverse views, understand alternative perspectives and be able to evaluate them. This paper describes a sequence of active learning activities centered on the Federal budget based both within and outside of class. These activities are designed to help students develop critical thinking skills, create a more inclusive classroom environment and increase the appeal of the economics major to a wider constituency. This unit provides an excellent starting point for examining policy issues such as the budget deficits and tax cuts. As a consequence of these activities, students become more critical thinkers and collaborative classmates, and overall participation increases.

Keywords: Pedagogy, diversity, critical thinking, macroeconomics, race, gender

JEL Classification: A22, A13, A21