AP Econ lesson plans that run themselves

Semester pacing guides

The week-by-week map: start here if you are planning a syllabus.

AP Microeconomics Pacing Guide: 16-Week One-Semester Syllabus →

This is a 16-week pacing guide for a one-semester AP Microeconomics course running on roughly 50-minute periods. The unit order follows the current College Board CED, and the number of weeks per unit tracks exam weight: Supply and Demand (Unit 2, 20 to 25%) gets four weeks, Production and Perfect Competition (Unit 3, 22 to 25%) gets three, Imperfect Competition (Unit 4) gets three, and the lighter Factor Markets and Market Failure units get one week each. Weeks 15 and 16 are cumulative review.

AP Macroeconomics Pacing Guide: A 16-Week Semester Plan →

This is a 16-week, week-by-week plan for a one-semester AP Macroeconomics course on roughly 50-minute periods. It follows the official College Board unit order and weights the calendar the way the exam does: Units 3, 4, and 5 carry the most points and get the most weeks, while Unit 1 stays lean. Each week lists the CED topics to cover, the matching EconLearn lesson plan, and honest notes on what drags and what to compress.

AP Microeconomics lesson plans

Scarcity, the PPC, and Comparative Advantage →AP Micro Unit 1 · 2 periods

If every choice has a cost, how do we measure it, and how does that logic decide who should produce what?

Supply, Demand, Shifts, and Price Controls →AP Micro Unit 2 · 3 periods

What actually moves a price, and what happens when the government tries to hold that price somewhere the market would not put it?

Elasticity, the Total Revenue Test, and Classifying Goods →AP Micro Unit 2 · 2 periods

When a seller raises the price, does revenue go up or down, and what about the buyers decides which way it goes?

Utility Maximization and the Downward-Sloping Demand Curve →AP Micro Unit 1 · 1 period

With a fixed budget and everything you want, how do you spend the last dollar so no rearranging could make you happier?

Production and the Short-Run Cost Curves →AP Micro Unit 3 · 2 periods

Why do the short-run cost curves bend the way they do, and how does the production function explain every one of them?

Perfect Competition: The Price-Taking Benchmark →AP Micro Unit 3 · 2 periods

If a firm has no power to set its own price, how does it decide how much to make, and why does its profit vanish in the long run?

Monopoly: Price Makers and Deadweight Loss →AP Micro Unit 4 · 2 periods

How does a single seller choose its price and quantity, and what does society lose when it does?

Monopolistic Competition and Excess Capacity →AP Micro Unit 4 · 1 period

How can a firm have real pricing power and still end up with zero economic profit in the long run?

Oligopoly and Game Theory: Payoff Matrices and Why Cartels Cheat →AP Micro Unit 4 · 2 periods

When only a few firms share a market, why does self-interest push them to an outcome that leaves all of them worse off?

Factor Markets: MRP, Wage Determination, and Monopsony →AP Micro Unit 5 · 3 periods

How does a firm decide how many workers to hire, and what changes when only one employer is buying the labor?

Market Failure: When Free Markets Miss the Efficient Quantity →AP Micro Unit 6 · 2 periods

If free markets usually allocate resources efficiently, what conditions make them get the quantity wrong, and how do we see it on a graph?

Externalities and Public Goods: Pigouvian Taxes and Subsidies →AP Micro Unit 6 · 2 periods

When a market over- or under-produces because of spillovers, exactly how big should the tax or subsidy be to fix it?

AP Macroeconomics lesson plans

Basic Macro Concepts: Scarcity, PPC, and Comparative Advantage →AP Macro Unit 1 · 2 periods

If every economy faces scarcity, how do the PPC and comparative advantage let us measure the cost of a choice and the gains from trading it away?

GDP: Expenditure Approach, Real vs Nominal, and Its Limits →AP Macro Unit 2 · 2 periods

How do we add up an entire economy's output without double counting, and why can GDP rise even when a country is worse off?

Unemployment and Inflation: Measuring the Two, and the Trade-Off →AP Macro Unit 2 · 2 periods

How do we measure who counts as unemployed and how fast prices rise, and why do these two numbers usually move in opposite directions in the short run?

The Business Cycle: Phases, Output Gaps, and Indicators →AP Macro Unit 2 · 1 period

How does real GDP move around potential output, and how can you name the phase and the output gap from a graph in seconds?

Aggregate Demand: Components, the Three Effects, and the Multipliers →AP Macro Unit 3 · 2 periods

What makes total spending in an economy rise or fall, and how far does one dollar of new spending move real GDP?

Aggregate Supply: SRAS, Vertical LRAS, and Self-Correction →AP Macro Unit 3 · 2 periods

Why can output rise above or fall below potential in the short run, and what pulls it back on its own?

Fiscal Policy: Spending, Taxes, the Multipliers, and Crowding Out →AP Macro Unit 3 · 2 periods

How does Congress use spending and taxes to close an output gap, and what limits how well it works?

Monetary Policy: Money Market, Fed Tools, and Transmission →AP Macro Unit 4 · 2 periods

How does the Fed move an interest rate in New York into a factory build in Tennessee and a mortgage in Phoenix?

The Loanable Funds Market and Crowding Out →AP Macro Unit 4 · 2 periods

How do savers and borrowers set the real interest rate, and why does government borrowing push private investment out of the market?

Economic Growth: Sources, the Rule of 70, and Growth Policy →AP Macro Unit 5 · 2 periods

What makes an economy's productive capacity grow over decades, and why do small growth-rate differences compound into large gaps in living standards?

International Trade: Comparative Advantage, World Prices, and Tariffs →AP Macro Unit 6 · 3 periods

Why do nations specialize and trade even when one is better at making everything, and how do tariffs and quotas redistribute the gains while shrinking them?

Exchange Rates and the Foreign Exchange Market →AP Macro Unit 6 · 2 periods

What moves a currency's value, and how does a change in interest rates travel through the exchange rate to net exports and aggregate demand?