Bulletin No. 2, 2016

16 Chinese University Bulletin No. 2, 2016 Raising the Bar of Macroeconomics Education The curriculum of macroeconomics has been evolving with global economic development. Faced with an expanding curriculum, Dr. David Chow (right), Dr. Fred Ku (centre) and Dr. Andrew Yuen (left), senior lecturers from the Department of Decision Sciences and Managerial Economic, determined to create animated micro- modules to engage students in the fast-paced society exploded with information. ‘Students know that the US will increase the interest rate, but they might not know the whole picture. We envision using multimedia to arouse students’ curiosity in exploring the current affairs and delve into the economic phenomenon,’ said Dr. Ku. In this sense, animated real-life scenarios and graphical elaborations are the catalyst to knowledge acquisition, but not the endpoint per se. Every topic in the micro-modules was carefully selected. Dr. Yuen said, ‘The aggregate demand– aggregate supply (AD -AS ) ’ model is of ten used to explain some macroeconomic events. We chose this topic for students’ pre-lecture preparation due to its applicability and room for discussion.’ In large classes, students are used to responding to questions via the classroom communication system uReply with their mobile devices. ‘Students in my class are divided into 10 groups, with each containing around seven people. The leaders will input their collective wisdom on the system and the real-time answers will be displayed by groups,’ said Dr. Ku. They