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When I was a teacher in California, I once went to a quick workshop about Bizworld, and I thought it was the coolest teaching ever! Bizworld is a program or toolkit that introduces the concept of entrepreneurship to students in primary school and even secondary school. I thought students at Guan Ai would definitely enjoy such a task and learn a great deal about business and math.

The Challenge: Student groups create a friendship bracelet company

Materials: Friendship bracelet string

Timeframe: Two weeks

When I first met with the 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade math teachers to do this multi-grade level project, they were all really excited. We planned out the entire process together in a single meeting. The culmination would be at the New Years celebration event where the students would actually sell the friendship bracelets (using Guan Ai money) to the parents.

Step One: Play and Create

The teachers asked me if I knew how to make a friendship bracelet. Of course I didn’t, but the kids will know, and if they don’t already know, they will learn quickly. We introduced the project to the students who couldn’t wait to get started. Each group was originally given 10-12 strings to get started. We pushed them to all learn how to make beautiful friendship bracelets in just a few days. They had to learn quickly, or else their company wouldn’t make money. During this time, students groups also assigned company positions to group members: CEO, VP, CFO, and Marketing Director.

Step Two: Market Research

Students needed to understand the friendship bracelet market. Companies formulated survey questions to ask potential customers. They went around asking both students and teachers questions like “Do you like thick bracelets or thin bracelets?” and “What’s you’re favorite color?”

Step Three: Pricing and Profit

The teachers wanted the project to challenge the students in each grade level, so we decided that the prices for friendship bracelets would be different per grade level. 3rd grade students were still in the process of using multiplication, so each friendship bracelet string would cost them 1 Guan Ai Yuan. For 4th grade, which we believed could work with halves, would be charged 0.5 Guan Ai Yuan per friendship bracelet string. 5th Grade had just learned all about decimals and fractions this semester would have a price of 0.25 Guan Ai Yuan per string. Each company could ask for around 50 friendship bracelet strings, so they also had to figure out how much money they needed to borrow from the Guan Ai bank.

Using this information, companies first figured out what type of friendship bracelets they would sell. Would they only sell a 5-string bracelet? Would the company also make other kinds of bracelets? Then companies calculated the cost of each bracelet, set prices, and determined the profit. Within each price, they would also have to provide the numbers in situations where the friendship bracelets were discounted. Only after the market research and the profit calculations could companies borrow money from the Guan Ai Bank.

Step Four: Preparation

With two days left until the New Years celebration event, companies rushed to make their bracelets to sell. Due to the time constraints of the upcoming semester exams, we didn’t have enough time to make posters to advertise their product.

Step Five: Sell, Sell, Sell!

Besides selling friendship bracelets, each student group would first display their Chinese, science, and social studies work on the New Years celebration event. Afterwards the teachers brought out the Guan Ai money and started handing parents handfuls to barter and haggle with students. Some companies made loads of money by selling off their merchandise very quickly. Other companies struggled and ended up cutting prices very to make ends meet. With three grade levels and a total of twenty-four companies competing for customers, the schoolyard turned into a bona fide marketplace.

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