Materials on the Economic Crisis

Because there was a great deal of web research done over the last couple of nights, I wanted to post some of the links that I found concerning the one year anniversary of the housing, bank and credit crisis.  Here it goes:

1) Inside the Meltdown (Frontline/PBS) http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/meltdown/  This documentary really explains how the crisis was created and how the government initially reacted in emergency mode.  The website has a lot of useful information too.  I played the intro clip to set the mood for the rest of the information.

2) Teachable Moment http://www.teachablemoment.org/index.html  This website had a great deal of lesson plans, not just on this issue but on many.  I am definitely going to come back here for more ideas.  I specifically found a lot of good information on this link from their site: http://www.teachablemoment.org/middle/crisis.html.  One of my favorites was the description of a trillion dollars.  Visually, it had the greatest impact.

3) Paul Solman http://www.pbs.org/newshour/businessdesk/ (Newshour/PBS) is one of my favorite news journalists.  His quirky attitude and nostalgia for cartoons and weird stuff in his pieces really gets me.  This is his blog and it has a lot of useful information.  I played some of his video clips on the crisis for the class.

4) National Debt Clock http://www.usdebtclock.org/  This site was one I didn’t use in class today, but I will next time.  It is a freak out of numbers but it really drives home how fast the debt rises.

5) Recovery.gov  http://www.recovery.gov/  This site was one that had a lot of information about local uses of the stimulus money but a lot of it was over the head of the kids.  I only provided a surface examination of the content and this stuff really requires a week or so of depth to really sink home the story.