Natalie took a test during the entire period today. For homework, I assigned reading pages 555-556 from the text in addition to 3 pages of supplemental college level material I distributed discussing the elements of the LEI or the leading economic index.Also due for Tuesday, is completing the study guide questions on measuring economic performance and the separate study guide on the LEI which requires Natalie to highlight answers to questions as preparation for college study.

Natalie had what she thought was her homework assignment out for me to check. When I checked the papers she had given me, I was unable to find the homework and told her so. She looked though her papers and wasn't able to find the assignment.
I moved on to today's topic: exponents and order of operations. I gave Natalie some problems involving the use of exponents in combination with parentheses in numeric problems. I also checked her ability to multiply signed numbers and get the correct sign. Natalie did fairly well with few mistakes. Her biggest problem was raising negative numbers to exponents. I gave her six problems to reinforce the lesson.

As investors, the government, and businesses all rely on economic indicators in order to make decisions, today we examined inflation, recession, GDP, real GDP, and the unemployment rate. Natalie answered study guide questions on these areas ,and we discussed how economists can manipulate statistics. For example, the unemployment rate only measures civilians who are both unemployed and who are still looking for work. Natalie then analyzed a graph that illustrated the relationship between recessions and the unemployment rate. As there will be a test tomorrow on stocks ,bonds, and forms of business ownership, per Natalie's request, Natalie also studied for her test during a portion of the class. For homework -study for the test.

In preparation for a test on Thursday, Natalie continued answering comprehension questions from the text on the forms of business ownership, the advantages of different forms of ownership, and public goods and externalities. Her work on these questions has been very complete ,accurate , and well written. We then reviewed her lengthy essay on income inequality, and discussed grammar and word choice issues, writing a conclusion, and formulating more specific solutions for the discussed social and economic issues. For homework, I assigned reading pages 549-553 in the text and answering questions 1-6 in the study guide.

I showed Natalie three examples of graphing linear equations. Each example was chosen to demonstrate different features of the linear equations. There were examples with positive and negative whole number coefficients of the 'x' term, and examples with positive and negative y-intercepts. I then gave her four problems with different slope and y-intercept characteristics and gave her time to work on them independently. Natalie worked on the four problems for about 25 minutes and then came to the teachers' work room to get me. When I corrected her answers, I found that all of them were graphed incorrectly but that she got some elements of the graphing correct. She told me that she understood how to graph but was doing it wrong. I assigned her two additional graphing problems.

I checked Natalie's homework which showed improvement in some areas while still showing some difficulty in distributing to all terms. I gave her a few problems for her to work on independently and gave her some time to work on them alone. When I returned, she had finished the problems but there were still errors. I gave her some homework problems to reinforce gains she had made.

I graded Natalie's homework in which she was mostly unsuccessful. I then showed her more examples of linear equations with diagrams of what the different parts of a linear equation do. I gave her four more equations to graph independently. When I rejoined her, I saw that she had made some progress, but still was graphing incorrectly. There was no assignment.

Today Natalie is studying D. H. Lawrence and taking a quiz on the material. She is using the time today to hopefully complete the British Literature 'project' which is a Timeline of the great authors and works that she has studied chronologically so far this year. She is using an excellent resource online to help her accomplish this successfully.

Natalie is trying to complete the work on The Heart of Darkness this week, but it may spill over until after the break. She has parts one and two of the packet (graded as "project") complete, and worked hard on part 3. She is also taking a Heart of Darkness vocabulary test soon. She began the session with a short documentary on Imperialism that included the Congo (as in the book) and expanded out a bit to China and another couple of countries. This was intended to augment background understanding of the book.

Natalie completed reading on mergers and monopolies as well as on "externalities" of economic activity. We then completed in-class exercises on government involvement in the economy ,and discussed collateral impacts of certain economic activity such as the expansion of I-95. We further discussed examples of "public goods" and why economists like John Galbraith favored spending on public,rather than private goods. Natalie did very well on the in-class work and displayed a very good understanding of the area. We then did a review exercise on corporations and partnerships. Natalie handed in her lengthy essay on fiscal policy and income inequality and indicated she would like to do additional similar work to practice essay writing. For homework, there is no reading or study guide work ,but we will have a test on the material we have been reviewing all week on Tuesday,March 26th.