Econosaurus

Earlier this week I ran a session at the Bank of England Teacher Conference on improving writing in economics A-level. This is a write-up of that session, partly so the delegates have it all in one place, and partly so anyone who couldn't make it can pinch the bits that are useful. All of the worksheets are available in the download at the end of the article. I'll be honest here and say that I haven't proofread this, but I knew that if I waited until I had it, it would be for

At the Bank of England Teacher Conference this I gave a talk on improving economic writing. I’ve got a much more detailed blog post coming with the full content of that presentation as I know quite a few people couldn’t make it on the day due to the weather. Even though the talk was on writing, we talked a bit about reading and I promised extra info on two tools. The first, I flagged in the talk itself; the other came up while I was chatting to a couple of people afterwards.

[Admission: I actually wrote most of this a year ago and never got around to posting it.] A few years ago I wrote about an experiment I was just starting: getting a whole class to read the same non-fiction book together, a "Class Read". You can find that original post here, and it lays out where I started and why. I'm pleased to say the experiment stuck. This is also one of my Classroom Systems; you can take a look at the others here. I've packaged up all the resources that I

A not-perfect but fairly easy-to-implement system for regular reading. We really want my students to be reading, and ideally reading non-narrative non-fiction that builds up their contextual knowledge. So, what I was after was a system that gets students reading the right sort of stuff, at a level that's accessible to them, in a way that doesn't eat up a bunch of teacher time. I just posted about Class Read and I still love that system, but there are a few barriers to settin

Overview The World Cup Application Project is designed to help students develop their macroeconomic application and judgement skills. Although the project uses the structure of the World Cup, the focus is not on football (I have a blog post coming out with Economics of the World Cup links soon for that!) Students use the countries in World Cup groups as case studies for researching economic conditions and applying macroeconomic policy decisions. The project has two main stage

This has more extracts in it than a normal paper 3 and two of each type of question, so it's less suitable for strict time practise but better for general technique practise. The combination of: no choice in the AQA paper 3 (after students are typically used to hedging their revision based on the notion they do get a choice in P1 and P2 a topic that typically students under revise a topic which has pretty good synoptic links all means I always want to make sure students have

Really looking forward to our next EconEdChat on Tuesday 9th June at 6pm. This one is an open session, so there’ll be plenty of time to share ideas, discuss what’s working, and talk through anything you’re thinking of changing before the new year. These sessions are always relaxed but hopefully still useful. You can come with something specific in mind, or just listen in and leave with a few new ideas. All Economics teachers and trainees are very welcome.details at bit.ly/eco

Run by the LSE Students' Union Economics Society in partnership with Aseeder Education, this is a free, global competition for students who have just finished their penultimate or final year of secondary school, plus those entering university in 2026/27 (gap year and post-military entrants included). Entrants pick one of five prompts set by LSE economics professors and write up to 1,500 words, with a deadline of 1 September 2026 and results in November. A good one to set for

Run jointly by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office and the Hub for Equal Representation at LSE, this is one of the more accessible essay competitions for 14 to 18 year olds: students write a 1,000 word letter to Professor Dennis Novy responding to one of four set questions, and no prior study of economics is required. The 2026 deadline is 11:59pm on 28 June, entries are split into Under 16 and Under 18 categories, and prizes run from £100 for shortlisted entrants