The Teen Scene - Lesson 2

Hello Entrepreneurs!

This week we got a start on planning and designing our own Teen Clubs. There were lots of great ideas being thrown around for making an amazing Teen Club during the brainstorming session, but we had to make sure that we were keeping in mind our 'BIG 4'. The design of the room took a bit longer than planned, but that is okay since we collectively decided to spend a bit more time on it and we will continue working on it next week.


Why this project? This project is a hands on way to understand our 'BIG 4'. The 'BIG 4' are the 4 things we must do and understand be be a successful entrepreneur.

The BIG 4

The 'Big 4', as an entrepreneur you must:

1. Fill A Need: know what is needed in your area and know your potential competitors
2. Research: Know your customer and your product (or service). Have expert knowledge of both the customer and the product.
3. Be Creative and Innovative: think outside the box, look for new and different solutions to needs that have been identified
4. Believe in Yourself and Love what you do: Know your likes and passions, skills/abilities, and work to improve them.


Class Chat:

We reviewed our 'BIG 4', this will be talked about so much in this class you will be chanting the list in your dreams. Last week we went over the the 'BIG 4' but this week we went even deeper with understanding why this works and how to apply it to a business, in this case the Teen Club.

Acquiring skills was another point of discussion during this class. How do we get more skill and why is this important? Some of our skills are self taught . We might need to seek out an apprenticeship with an expert, and part of being a great entrepreneur is knowing when you need to improve.

We put brainstorming into action to generate our Teen Club business ideas, it was a great way to make sure all ideas were considered before designing the final Teen Club. You guys were so great and respectful to your class members, I'm so impressed with you all. No idea was looked down upon and you really made sure that if something didn't fit the 'Big 4' the other class member understood why.

The rest of the class was spent on designing the Teen Club, some amazing questions were discussed, such as:

Will we put an age limit on the club? How will that impact the Teen Club?
What setting is our teen club in? Rural, city, urban?
How will we fund our club?
How will we split the income between the owners?
Is the scale correct?
What will we have to cut out due to space limitations?
How can we make sure we are reaching the widest range of teens?

Key Terms of the Week: The words and terms we discussed as a group

Market : A collection of current and/or prospective customers
Apprentice : A person who studies with experts to learn more in a specific field
Market Research: Gathering and evaluating data regarding customers' preferences for products and services
Brainstorming: A method to generate ideas

Additional Work: None!

I Am an Entrepreneur - Lesson 1

Steve Jobs, young entrepreneur started his own company at age 21. Today he is CEO of Apple, Inc.

Class Review, Day 1

What is an entrepreneur?

An entrepreneur is a person who starts his or her own business in hope of earning a profit. Profit is income earned after all your expenses are paid. An entrepreneur is able to recognize customer wants and provide a product or service for this want.


The 'Big 4', as an entrepreneur you must:

1. Fill A Need: know what is needed in your area and know your potential competitors
2. Research: Know your customer and your product (or service). Have expert knowledge of both the customer and the product.
3. Be Creative and Innovative: think outside the box, look for new and different solutions to needs that have been identified
4. Believe in Yourself and Love what you do: Know your likes and passions, skills/abilities, and work to improve them.

Vocabulary Review

Business: A company or organization that buys or sells products or product services


Customer: A person who purchases a product or service

Entrepreneur: A person who starts his or her own business in hope of earning a profit

Innovative: To create something new, original, or groundbreaking

Product: An item created for sale, like cookies or computers.

Service: Providing something useful, like babysitting or animal care.

Profit: Income earned after all expenses are paid


Class Chat: Today we played a quiz game and learned about famous entrepreneurs and how they got their start. We talked about Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Jennifer Lopez, Oprah Winfrey, and Madame CJ Walker, some entrepreneurs were very young when they started their businesses. All of these entrepreneurs decided to pursue their passions and make money doing what they loved the most.

But let's not forget not all business owners are entrepreneurs, remember the Ray Kroc example? Ray Kroc purchased McDonald's, a well established business, expanded on it and took the risks to make it a huge thriving business.

Homework, please have the answers to these questions ready for our next class:
Next week we will start file folders to collect our work and business plans

Writing Work:
How am I like the entrepreneurs I learned about?

What types of marketing set them apart from others in their speciality? (Example, Ben and Jerry's have funny names for flavors)

What are my specials skills and areas of expertise?

Start brainstorming and listing what type of business you will be opening
What type of business do I want to run?
How will I fund my venture? Bank money, personal money, shareholder

Additional Work:
Collect examples of businesses showing entrepreneurial risk taking - sales advertisements with sayings such as "The best in town", 'Lowest Prices Around", etc. If you are able to please clip or print out these examples so we can share them with the class.