Jobs have taken a whole new direction. Everyone is still doing their classroom job for pay, and quite a few people are trying to figure out what you do to get a raise.  But there is a new dimension.  Almost everyone is starting a business to provide goods and services at school.  This was initiated by the students, not by me.
The third grade is involved in a similar classroom economy.  Any students reading this- could you tell us if fifth got the idea from third, third got the idea from fifth, or both classes just happened to come up with the same idea? I don’t feel clear about how the businesses got started.

There are goods for sale at recess, and a couple of teams are advertising their services to the other classes and teachers.

Here are the conditions so far:
You can work on your business at break, at recess, or when your class work is entirely complete- if you finish early and don’t have unfinished work in your “in progress” folder, for instance.  People may form partnerships.  I am not requiring a business plan as I will in Village, because this is entirely voluntary.  I have distributed business plan forms, so that people can look them over and think about what they are going to need for a successful business. We have agreed that it isn’t wise to spend real money to get materials when you are going to be paid for your product in peep dollars. If you have scrap or extra materials around the house that you can spare, it would be lovely if you shared them with your young entrepreneurs.   But please don’t go out and buy supplies.  Lots of businesses get started on spare bits, but eventually buying supplies is part of the cost.  We will get into that more in Village.

Since we are now going to be buying and selling, every one has checks, and a check register, so that they can keep up with their money.  Every one’s bank account shows a summary of their transactions, but of course checks take some time to clear the bank.  We went over keeping a check register today; I am sure that we will need to do it again.  Feel free to show your child your check register or show them how you keep your books.

This is leading us, and me to larger questions of how an economy works.  Last year, in Village, we kept our economy closed- it could only increase in value if someone put resources or effort in.  I paid salaries, but if I ran out of money, we had to have taxes, or kidnap soccer balls, or something.  This year, we are paying taxes for Village improvements in the spring, but I am giving the other teachers money, and just printing more when we need it.  The salaries actually don’t come out of my account, they are deposited from a mysterious location.  So the question is- will this lead to inflation, or will it keep our economy growing?  A tightly controlled economy made growth difficult, so we are going to try a different way this year and see what happens.

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