At the end of each semester, the Profit Club does a brainstorming session and shares the lessons learned. This semester was twelve 4th and 5th graders, 8 boys and 4 girls. They never cease to amaze me how much they learn and apply what I teach them. I could not help but share the things they documented on the dry erase board during our classroom meeting time. Captured in their words:
What have you learned from working at the profit club store?
- Making money
- How to sell
- Giving change
- Got a lot of business
- You have to be nice to everyone even those people you may not like and normally would not even talk to.
- Customers can be brats and they spelled it BRatz. Basically, saying the customer can really be a pain and you have to be nice to them anyway.
- “The early bird gets the worm” – they quickly learned that if you are late for your work shift, the person who is at school early can take your place. Working the store for 20 minutes before school was their favorite part. A lesson for all of us that hands-on experience is the best way to learn and apply the objectives of the class.
- Good customer service
- Pricing
A great list for fourth and fifth graders running a profit club store selling healthy snacks 20 minutes a day before school. They were open 25 days, 20 minutes a day. The results: $402.79 profit deposited in their account to use toward helping others. They definitely met their objectives of learning about pricing, picking products to sell, and helping others “being a prophet” to donate to missions.