DALY CITY, Calif., Oct. 15 /PRNewswire/ -- Imagine playing musical chairs
where, when the music stops, one High School student lavishly stretches across
seven chairs and nine others struggle to fit into the remaining three. That's
how America's growing wealth gap is dramatized through a lesson called The Ten
Chairs announced by Bay Area education company Reach And Teach.
According to Steve Schnapp of United for A Fair Economy (UFE), census data
shows nearly 70% of private wealth is held by America's wealthiest 10%,
leaving approximately 30% shared by the bottom 90%. "One real tragedy of the
divide is the decline of America's middle class." said Schnapp. "About 40% of
Americans had their net worth decline by 43% since 1980, while the top 1%,
like the Forbes 400, saw their net worth increase by over 60%. If you're going
to teach economics, you've got to show how individual economic decisions and
national economic policies impact real people."
"Acting out how wealth is distributed by playing musical chairs isn't only
fun, it's quite eye-opening. Everyone can't fit into those last three chairs!
What do you say to those who fall off?," asked Reach And Teach's Derrick
Kikuchi. "To truly engage in our economic system and take charge of their own
economic futures students need to understand the differences between income
and wealth, savings and debt, how wealth is accumulated, and how government
policies influence our lives and the world. While most economics courses start
with the concept of scarcity, the Ten Chairs illustrate abundance that could
be more equitably shared."
Reach And Teach, UFE, and former High School teacher Tamara Sober Giecek
launched http://teachingeconomics.org which provides overviews of key economic
issues, and downloadable classroom materials based on a book produced by UFE
and Giecek. Moving this type of content to the web will make it more readily
available to teachers and easier to use. Kikuchi explained, "We start by
teaching key concepts through an engaging presentation and show step-by-step,
how to carry out the lesson. The lessons are also mapped into mandated
national curriculum standards."
Teachingeconomics.org will eventually have 21 lessons on the web site.
Grants and private donations will fund the project.
Derrick Kikuchi
Co-founder
Reach And Teach
415-586-1713
derrick@reachandteach.com
SOURCE Reach And Teach
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Related links:
http://Teachingeconomics.org
CONTACT:
Derrick Kikuchi, Co-founder of Reach And
Teach, +1-415-586-1713, derrick@reachandteach.com
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