If I were doing a unit on business or the economy, I would absolutely use materials from this site. Many of the readings are fairly short, and the language is pretty down to earth.

The RSA Animate series of video clips is an interesting way to present some very sophisticated ideas to learners. The visual nature of the lectures helps comprehension and helps hold student interest. The lecture above looks at how recent developments in cognitive science change our understanding of human nature. Other lectures deal with concepts like charity, choice, and education, just to name a few. In addition to the various content areas that these lectures could be used in, they would be a great addition to activities working on lecture listening and note taking.

Unfortunately, I didn’t find the RSA website so easy to navigate. For example, I couldn’t find a page that indexed all of the animated lectures. That said, there are many articles and other materials on the website that would be interesting to use in class, so poking around a bit is not a bad thing. If you’re looking for a shortcut, though, here is a search that highlights the RSA Animate lectures. Another approach is to browse through their YouTube channel, which includes many non-animated lectures as well.

Along the same lines, Yes Magazine has an article about 5 acts of performance-based protest. I’m not thrilled with the tone of the article (“laughtivism” seems overly reductive) but the events themselves are very interesting. For one thing, it is great to show students that activism has many different faces. I tend to emphasize the activism that we take in our everyday actions, and it is important show students the range of responses that are available.

Thank Tom (via IATEFL’s GISIG)

The first is The Economics of Happiness.

This documentary links a number of global issues (climate change, terrorism, etc.) with personal issues (depression, loneliness, etc.). I haven’t seen the whole thing, but the trailer brings up a lot of great stuff: true cost economics, the wastefulness of our “efficiency” of scale, and the importance of local communities. For more information, there is a recent review in Yes Magazine.

The other movie (thanks Khalid) is I AM.

It’s directed by the director of The Nutty Professor and Ace Ventura and the trailer is a little melodramatic, but the premise is interesting. He went to a wide variety of people (including personal favorites like Howard Zinn and Noam Chomsky) and asked them two questions:

1. What’s wrong with the world?
2. What can we do about it?

The ultimate conclusion seems to be that we are all very interconnected, and that we find happiness and health through taking care of each other. I think both of these movies (or at least clips from them) would work well in a unit on happiness and global issues.

For the last 40 years, ALEC has helped legislators draft conservative legislation and they claim that 18% of their bills end up as law. One recent victory was the controversial anti-immigration bill in Arizona. Cronon was curious to see if this group was also behind the recent anti-public-worker and anti-teacher legislation that has been cropping up throughout the country. Judging by the reaction of the GOP of Wisconsin, he seems to be on to something.

Following his post on ALEC, the Republican Party of Wisconsin made a request for access to Cronon’s emails, listing a number of politically-charged topics. Prof. Cronon explains it in this post, which is long but well worth the read. As a union-dues-paying faculty member at a public university in a state that also has strong Freedom of Information laws, I find this attempt by the Republican Party of Wisconsin to intimidate Prof. Cronon despicable. The anti-academic-freedom bias is troubling and quite hypocritical, coming from a group purportedly supporting individual liberty.

I’m not sure exactly how I would use this with students, but Prof. Cronon’s initial post on ALEC is presented as a study guide. It’s pretty high-level, but I would absolutely consider introducing these topics to a unit on politics or democracy. International students sometimes come to America with an idealized understanding of our democracy, without having considered the profound influence of corporate money. This would fit well with a look at the Tea Party and other astroturf organizations. It would also work alongside the video Corporations vs. Democracy.

Thanks USF-UFF

As a long time proponent of a maximum wage, I really like that Monbiot’s proposal calls for the creation of a High Wage commission as part of his overall push towards reducing wealth inequality. He also calls for shifting the tax burden off of the poor and lower middle class. I also really like his idea that by 2020, 20% of the tax burden should come from levies imposed for damaging the environment. Obviously, a lot of this could be applied in the US as well.

I think simplifying this document and asking students what sort of proposals they would make (either for their own country, a shared country [like the one they are studying in], or for a fictional country) could be a fun activity. Of course, other proposals (and campaign platforms) could also be included. Having students look at materials like this around an election and talk about what issues are missing from the discussion (and why they might be missing) is a great exercise in critical thinking.

Like the Story of Stuff, this information is presented fairly simply, with an explanatory cartoon. Thus, I think it could be comprehensible to many English language learners. They also offer captions and an annotated script so students can read along. The video isn’t too long, either, at just over 8 minutes. Another nice thing about it is that, despite the fairly bleak picture, the tone remains mostly positive.

Next on the Republican agenda of environmental retro moves? Lightbulbs. House Republicans introduced a bill last week to repeal the government’s decision to phase out the old energy-inefficient bulbs, which was due to start in 2012.

One interesting way to use this article might be to do a unit about being on the wrong side of history. You could have students read old articles defending the losing side of previously controversial issues. For example, you could have something explaining why women shouldn’t vote or why slavery should remain legal. Obviously, the language would probably need to be simplified and updated, but I think it would be interesting to look at the logic and at how our perception of what is ethically defensible has changed over time. We don’t always remember that much of what we currently find “controversial” will be seen as obvious (in one way or another) by future generations.

Thanks Khalid!

Mother Jones has put together a collection of 11 great infographics that look at the distribution of wealth in American from a number of different angles. I particularly like the one headed “Out of Balance” (included here) that compares perceptions, reality and preference. It is really incredible, with the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of so few, that so many Americans are still convinced that we are too “socialist” and that unions are the problem.

Thanks Larry