At the beginning of the third quarter, students in my English for Daily Living class were given the opportunity to showcase their entrepreneurial skills in a Shark Tank-style project. The activity, designed to write a persuasive essay and a biography based on an entrepreneur of their choosing, challenged them to create their own company and pitch their ideas to their classmates.
The students spent weeks researching an entrepreneur of their choosing, developing their business ideas, honing their marketing strategies, and drawing up prototypes of their products in hopes of persuading their classmates to want to buy into their business.
The first thing students did was research an entrepreneur of their choosing. The goal was to find commonalities between the entrepreneurs and for students to write a short biography about their entrepreneur.
After writing their biographies, students then began to brainstorm ideas of what type of product or business they would like to create. They thought of ideas that could help solve problems that they or someone else had experienced. After thinking of a business idea or product idea, students researched costs, advertising, and marketing to make their product.
Students had a few days to work out the details of their business and then to create a pitch to sell their business idea or product to the “sharks.” This was in the form of a persuasive essay. The pitches were well thought out and developed, but students also received a wake-up call when they found out just how much it costs to start a business or to get their product on the shelves.
Overall, this was an extremely fun and successful project. Students were able to research, give speeches, and have fun creating their very own products or business, and I believe we might have some future entrepreneurs on our hands!