Grade 7s turn the school into a marketplace
Laerskool Barberton Primary’s Grade 7 learners traded their schoolbooks for business plans during the annual Entrepreneurs Day.
There was a distinctly entrepreneurial buzz around Laerskool Barberton Primary when the Grade 7 learners put their business skills to the test during the school’s annual Entrepreneurs Day on Friday. For one day, the learners stepped into the roles of business owners, salespeople, marketers and financial managers as they brought their carefully planned mini businesses to life.
The activity forms part of the Economic and Management Sciences curriculum and gives the Grade 7s an opportunity to experience, rather than simply study, some of the principals involved in running a business.
Under the guidance of their teacher, Mr Nathaniël Strydom, each learner was responsible for developing a business plan and then putting that plan into practice. This meant deciding what to sell, calculating expenses, planning purchases, considering pricing and ultimately seeing whether their business would make a profit or suffer a loss.
The school grounds soon took on the atmosphere of a small marketplace, with colourful advertising posters and creatively decorated stalls competing for the attention of potential customers and there was certainly no shortage of customers. School was put on pause for most of the morning as learners from the rest of the school made their way from stall to stall, with plenty of tempting options on offer. Chips, cooldrinks and sweets were among the familiar favourites, while other Grade 7 entrepreneurs served up hot dogs, samoosas, cake, cupcakes, corn dogs and hamburgers.
Some of the young business owners even took their marketing strategy a step further by visiting teachers beforehand to take pre-orders, proving that good salesmanship can begin well before the doors to the market open.
Not every business followed the traditional food-stall route. One group opted to turn their classroom into a mini cinema, showing a movie that attracted strong support from the school. Naturally, no cinema experience would be complete without refreshments, so the budding entrepreneurs also operated their own tuck shop alongside the screening.
While the day was clearly filled with fun, the underlying lesson was a serious one. The project challenged learners to think about the practical decisions that businesses face every day and to discover that making money involves considerably more than simply selling something at a higher price than it cost.
Planning, budgeting, marketing, teamwork and customer service all became part of the learning experience, with the learners having to take responsibility for bringing their ideas from paper to reality. The Entrepreneurs Day also gave the Grade 7s an opportunity to display their individual creativity and initiative, while learning to work with the practical realities of their chosen businesses.
Although the event provided plenty of enjoyment for both the young entrepreneurs and their customers, there was also an academic component to the exercise. Each learner was assessed on the business plan submitted as part of the project, with the mark contributing towards their Economic and Management Sciences assessment for the third term.
For the Grade 7s, it was a day of selling, buying, calculating, promoting and problem-solving, all within the familiar surroundings of their school. While not every mini business may have produced the next great business empire, the experience certainly gave the learners a valuable taste of what it takes to turn an idea into a working enterprise.
Lynette Spencer
Mariana Balt
Anchen Coetzee
Naomi Roebert
Liz Thorne
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