Box CIty

So as a 4th grader at our school, you have to participate in Box City. Each of the classes create a city, form a government, start a business, pay bills, keep budgets, purchase different insurances (property, liability, health-this one he didn't purchase, a gamble that ended up paying off) etc.........
Zach ran for City Council, & WON. He & Tyler came up with a business that no one had done before........plans were in motion! The hardest part was finding a box! The size requirements meant you needed an appliance box, which is HUGE! Top that off with 60 kids wanting them at the same time,.......they weren't easy to come by! We ended up getting sheets of cardboard from Lowes, and cutting it down & folding it into a box.

Next step was to decorate it. Zach mentioned wanting bricks, so I showed him how to do that, using a sponge & 3 colors of paint.........he did such a great job...........all freehand too! He is such a smart kid.......he bid on his store location, getting a "corner lot on main street"...........perfect. Top that off with the logo he & I created - he was slick! His product was kept under wraps until he had to fill it in on his business licence........Fruity Putty.
During Tourist Season, families can come & shop & are given "money" to use. He was SOOOO busy! He sold out of all 7 scents that day! (When we made them, we got about 26-28 items from each scent, so that's a ton of putty!). So last Monday night, we made 7 more batches of putty (basically a scented play-dough). He sold strawberry-banana, strawberry, raspberry, lemon, lime, orange, peach, and as a special, "one-day-only" scent - black cherry). Since it's called Fruity "Putty", he had plastic eggs the buyers could have to store the putty, like you'd see silly putty in the store. He's a marketing genious for sure!
His goal is to become the "millionaire" for his city, Orcaopolis. They had to draw "fate" cards every day at lunch. Last Thursday, he drew the one EVERYBODY wants - he won the LOTTO - getting $1000!!! Tomorrow they count all their money to see who has the most - that person will be declared the "millionaire" & will have a "park" named after them for next years "box city". The person who has about the same amount of $ is the Health Office/Ticketer......so she has had the ability to ticket people & SHE gets the $ from it......... She learned that she can "make up" reasons to give people tickets.... kinda like the real world I suppose. It's been a very interesting project. I like how serious Zach takes his school work. We're proud of you Zachy - love you!