8yo has to start business - alone

[notimetoshop]

I almost put this on aibu but....
My Y3 is doing some entrepreneur education, to raise money for charity.
So far, fine.
But she has been given £1 and told to go away and do it.
I was 'well the school will set up little stalls for you and invite parents in' etc. But no. They are expected to go and invest the money (£1?) and bring back a return. Apart from telling us it's probably not a good idea to start selling stuff on high street and 'try and include people outside family' that's really it.
I'm thinking well I'll just have to make cakes and sell them at work - but I can't see how that's going to be v educational for her at all. What would you do?

You know OP, I wouldn't have blamed you for putting this in AIBU. As good as all the money making suggestions are, I would object on three counts.

Firstly a child of that age acting alone, in most cases, wouldn't be able to come up with a workable plan and carry it out, meaning that they need support from adults someone doing it for them with them tagging along. Secondly, school are unwilling to put something in place to make this easier, like a Market Day or similar. And thirdly, you weren't given the option to opt in or out based on family circumstances. I'm also uncomfortable with children being encouraged at this age to interact with people not known well to the family. Everyone in school has to be checked, everyone on your street doesn't.

Having said this, my DS1 (9) sings in a choir which was going away on tour. The children were encouraged to earn money doing these sorts of things to reduce the cost to their own parents. We helped him bake buns and biscuits and arranged for him to come to my work during the school holidays to seek his wares. A bit of intranet advertising and he made a £45 profit on his £45 investment. Would have been very difficult with only £1 seed money though and impossible without my support.

Go to the poiund shop and look at packs of things. Buy a pack, split it up and sell individually.

Repeat with profits.

'meaning that they need support from adults'

they need support from adults to learn to read and write, do you object to the school sending home reading books?

Secondly, school are unwilling to put something in place to make this easier, like a Market Day or similar.

It's homework. Homework isn't supposed to be done at school.

'And thirdly, you weren't given the option to opt in or out based on family circumstances.'

You don't get the option to opt in or out of any homework/school project based on your family circumstances! If you don't like it, home school.

'I'm also uncomfortable with children being encouraged at this age to interact with people not known well to the family'

Really?

OP there are loads of things she could so with minimal help. I think the £1 shop is probably your friend.

buy beads and make bracelets to sell.
buy a big bag of sweets, split into smaller lots, wrap in some nice paper and sell for 50p each.
buy a pack of pencils/bouncy balls/bubbles and sell on indvidually
buy some bin bags and offer a leaf raking/collecting service for £1
make cards and sell them
make a lucky dip and charge 20p a go

I would imagine the point of the activity is the process of coming up with an idea, planning and carrying it out, not really about how much she makes.

Hi notimetoshop

First - I think you need to have a word with the school about sending instructions home to parents, so you have a better understanding of what is invisioned.

How you can help:

Well there are a couple of ideas.

BOOKMARKS
The school should have a laminator. Your DD could make bookmarks at home on white paper (use A4 - which is the size of most lamination sheets - and cut it into strips).

DD can decorate bookmarks as she likes. Bright patterns. Big logos/ words - READ FOR FUN! or MY BOOK! Stickers (if you have some - kids magazines are great for this). Her fellow students' names - good marketing.

Place as many bookmarks as you can into a lamination wallet (leaving a bit of edge around each - a good way is to cut 5 5cm wide strips off the A4 paper - and that will give a nice border around each bookmark).

Pay the school for lamination wallets (arrange with secretary or teacher - and work out how many you can afford in advance).

Sell at school drop off/ pick up times (when parents are there with money!). If children go to after school clubs - have them bring in money next day if they want one.

Work out a nice profit. So if a lamination sheet cost 20p - sell each bookmark for 30p and that's 50p profit per sheet. If you feel they're super nice - sell for 50p - and that £1.50 profit per sheet.

TABLE TOP SALE
Gather up old unwanted toys/ DVDs (siblings included & canvas friends for donations) - and set up a stall outside your house/flat and sell toys to other children in the neighbourhood. Can do the same after school on a couple of days.

BADGES/ BRACELETS
Some children have badge or bracelet kits - and lots of materials at home already. You can make badges/ bracelets and then sell them on at school (again before/ after school at drop off/ pick up time is best - because parents will have the money).

HOT COCO/ TEAS
If the school has an urn anyway - they may allow your DC to run a tea/ coffee/ coco stall for parents at a meeting or an assembly. Parents always love a warm drink this time of year. Usually the PTA/ FRIENDS OF X school have tea/ coffee/ coco supplies - so agree you'll split proceeds with them - but you can probably run the stall quite effectively and make a nice profit - because parents will make their coffees for themselves. You just need to buy as much milk as you can for the pound (or see if PTA will donate that too). If they will buy an economic pack of biscuits.

RAFFLE TICKETS
(Only if this project is a fund-raiser for the school)

Buy the nicest chocolate Santa you can for a £1. And sell Raffle tickets (which you can make in advance on paper - need to make 2 for each number - fold A4 sheet lengthwise in half and then in half again - then mark off tickets. Cut sheet in half - and cut up through bottom row of tickets so you can quickly tear off for each purchase).

Sell tickets for 10 - 20p - and should make a nice profit.

BOOK EXCHANGE
Get a free fruit box from the grocery store and decorate it. Make posters for the school advertising that you're running a book exchange and ask students to bring in their books. Allow about a week - to collect in as many books as you can.

Make another poster announcing the start of the book exchange (and maybe indicating thousands of great books available) and say for every book taken from the exchange you're asking for a donation of 10p toward a new book fund for the school library.

You advertise the really juicy books available (so making updated posters each week) - and run the stall at recess/ lunchtime.

The £1 should cover poster supplies.

HTH

In answer to HolyAGB, actually I think homework ought to be something to solidify something being done in school not a thing to create an opportunity for parents to homeschool in addition to school. Support of an adult in the home environment for homework is perfectly reasonable but more or less requiring the adult to lead and undertake the activity so that the child is seen to do the homework is questionable in terms of what it achieves.

give her a business loan. Contract, interest... That's good to learn.

and there have been some really great ideas on this thread.

I like Past's raffle idea of the Chocolate the best.

But I really don't like this sort of thing any more than having to collect sponsor money. I would be really if either DS came home with it.

Sell at school drop off/ pick up times (when parents are there with money!). If children go to after school clubs - have them bring in money next day if they want one.

Fine if only one child is doing it, but as the whole class has been given the project, it might be rather annoying for parents being approached by a large number of kids selling things that they don't actually want to buy. It would be annoying even if it was a charity fund-raiser which this is not.

I imagine it is a maths project (we've always run ours in groups with lots of guidance and supervision inside school).
One group costed fruit for snack time and how much they had to sell each piece for to make a profit which was reinvested each day (with the teacher doing the shopping every night) for a week. Another group bought the materials and made friendship bracelets, another group made cup cakes ... A letter went home to parents of children not involved explaining there would be items for sale and the cost. Profits were used to provide a small treat for every child.

I think groups would be better mrz. There's always going to be one or two kids that suddenly manage to raise loads more than anyone else by their parents just giving them the money.

Am back now I've had an idea

Give her a business loan of a fiver. Take her shopping for materials. Have her make Christmas cards and sell them to family members for them to send at christmas. She then has to repay the loan out of the profits, plus interest.

She gets more money for the startup, in a legitimate way if the aim is to teach them about business - then securing additional start up funding is not cheating and she can get some reasonable materials so she has more stock. Reinvest the profit and make some more cards. I am sure grandparents, aunties and uncles and family friends would be happy to pay a few quid for a pack of christmas cards done by her.

Government is pushing for business skills to be promoted in schools so just thinking about the challenge is a good exercise. Google 'schoolboy crawford cards' to see what can happen later if a business idea clicks.

'I think homework ought to be something to solidify something being done in school'

How do you know that it isn't? Just because the school won't set up a 'market day' doesn't mean they haven't been working on this theme/project at school as well.

'more or less requiring the adult to lead and undertake the activity so that the child is seen to do the homework is questionable in terms of what it achieves'

Why would the OP need to 'lead and undertake the activity'? The OP's DD is year 3 i.e. 7 or 8 years old, not 3 years old, have you misread the OP? DC1 is in yr 3 and quite capable of coming up with an idea like this and carrying it out. Obviously I'd have to take her to the shop as she's too young to go by herself, but that's hardly an unreasonable request by the school. She would be able to make bracelets/packets of sweets/lucky dip/bookmarks etc by her self. I'd just need to supervise (not lead and undertake) the selling of whatever she'd made.

OP could your DD pair up with another child and put their money together? Have the school said this isn't allowed?

Buy a load of cheap cards from The Card Factory then sell her a quids worth at a time so she can resell them at a profit. The 7 for £1 are good quality, and come wrapped.

How long has she got? Buy some cress seeds and grow them indoors. Sell the cress.

Dig up flowers in the park and sell them. Use the £1 to make a poster.

Buy a lottery ticket.

grovel cat's bum mouth at flowers from park

I don't think theft and gambling are what the school had in mind grovel.

Watch an episode of Antiques Road Trip together. Then take her to a car boot sale with her £1 in 5p pieces. Get her to find items to resell - doesn't have to be antiques - and haggle, haggle haggle. List items on ebay.

Does anyone else think the whole idea is a bit ugh? I wouldn't really want my 8 year old to be thinking about investments and financial stuff.

Trying to be constructive though.....: kidnap another pupil and hold them to ransom? The £1 would buy duct tape.

lol at kidnap idea.

I'm with the market day and working in teams ideas. Kids who come from families like the one I grew up in are going to find this very very difficult - I think it's an inclusion issue.

Having said that, there are some brill ideas on this thread.

My 9 year old took enterprise week very seriously indeed and the following summar he starting busking. He has made over £120 doing this although I should deduct the costs of (i) the coffees I have to buy as I sit behind him and (ii) the loss of earnings because I can't work while I'm in the cafe for fear that someone will shout at me for letting him busk. It has only happened once but that was stressful. Though the shouter was a bit flummoxed when I explained "don't worry, it's all inspired by enterprise week"

PS don't write in about licences for busking please.

I think the earlier they start to get to grips with the financial realities of life the better. People with a good understanding of business, of economics, of personal finance etc

That way we won't raise another generation who take out massive loans without understanding what the interest actually is and who ask why if the government doesn't have enough cash, they can't just print more money

We did this and made leaflets to look after small animals whilst people are away ie hamsters etc.

Get them to design and make some Xmas cards.