De Paul University: Center for Urban Education: Economic Connections [Pdf]

"Economic Connections" is a one-page nonfiction passage about the economics of importing and exporting goods among countries to get what people need. It is followed by an open-ended question that requires students to provide evidence from the story; it includes underlining the most important information in each paragraph, determining the main idea, and writing a summary of the passage using evidence from the text. This passage aligns with Common Core Anchor Reading Standards 1 and 2 requiring close reading, textual evidence, main idea, integrating ideas from different sources, and summarizing.