Optional Teaching Topic: How to Think Like an Economist... (Provided, That Is, You Wish to...) (Pre-Class? Mid-Class?)

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I have long had a "thinking like an economist" lecture in the can. But I very rarely give it. It seems to me that it is important stuff—that people really should know it before they begin studying economics, because it would make studying economics much easier. But it also seems to me—usually—that it is pointless to give it at the start of a course to newBs: they just won't understand it. And it also seems to me—usually—that it is also pointless to give it to students at the end of their college years: they either understand it already, or it is too late.

By continuity that would seem to imply that there is an optimal point in the college curriculum to teach this stuff. But is that true?

What do you think?

Teaching Materials Stock

Main Lecture Thread http://www.bradford-delong.com/how-to-think-like-an-economistlecture.html

Economics: What Kind of Discipline Is It?

A social science
- Example of things getting weird: Expectations: 1929, The Great Crash, and the Great Depression http://www.bradford-delong.com/1929-the-great-crash-and-the-great-depression.html
A quantitative social science
An abstract social science

The Rhetoric of Economics