Sponsors
Week 1
Team name: Leafy Habitats
Tell us what you have been doing this week
We were excited to meet Izzy and Andrew from Bechtel Cavendish. They told us a little bit about themselves and what they did. The children explained some of their ideas so far which were linked to the schools aims of increasing the biodiversity of our school grounds and involving the community. Last year half of the class took part in the John Muir Awards and had already made plans to improve the outdoor. 135 trees are due to be delivered in November and we have decided to get people to name a tree in memory(personal) or sponsor a tree(business). We are also making and selling bird feeders.
What did you learn this week?
We met Anna from the Warrington office who told us about admin work and things we would need to think of. We now know that a company name need to reflect what the company is about and needs to be catchy . We investigated logos and began to design our own to be judged by Izzy's office.
What did you find difficult this week?
We needed to make sure that our logo could be replicated easily. We now know there are lots more things to consider when running a business so we need to get busy.
Florence with the winning logo
Week 2 - half term
Week 3
Tell us what you have been doing this week
This week we looked at finance. Izzy had organised some people from Bechtel Cavendish to video call us to talk about their jobs. We researched the things we would need to buy to make our bird feeders and at any special deals we could use. We worked out how many we could make using our initial £50 and how much of each type. We also contacted a couple of companies to see if they could make plaques for us in bulk and what the costs would be. We made some posters advertising what we would be selling and the prices ready to display around the village and school. We decided where we were going to
What did you learn this week?
That sometimes you need to shop around to get the best price.
That we would need to sell some of our bird feeders to make the money to buy more resources to make more bird feeders,
We needed to think carefully about our prices so that we made the most profit but still were affordable and competitive
What did you find difficult this week?
Deciding on the price to charge. It couldn't be too high or they wouldn't sell but couldn't be too cheap so we didn't make a profit.
We also had to think hard to decide on our names for the products
Our social media advertising
Poster making
Talking to the engineers
What engineers do
Week 4
Tell us what you have been doing this week
This week Izzy had organised a mechanical engineer and an engineer to talk to us. They told us how they help to solve problems and that things don’t always go to plan. We wrote a letter together to try and get businesses to sponsor us and thought of places to contact who might help. We made sure our shopping list had everything we needed on it.
We have decided exactly where to put our trees now so checked the ground out. We have contacted a supplier for a price to make our plaques and engrave them so they will last
What did you learn this week?
We learnt that we had to be flexible and that things don’t always turn out how you planned but that is ok.
We learnt that it’s best to have more than one quote for a job and not to give up if things go wrong . We need to be resilient .
What did you find difficult this week?
Deciding how much of our £10 we could spend on the plaque.
Thinking of new ways to advertise
Week 5
Tell us what you have been doing this week
Unfortunately this week Issy couldn’t join us due to Storm Debi so we decided that we would make a video to have a final push on our tree plaques. We worked as a team to decide what to say and then made the clips into a video with the help from Year 5 and 6 . We were very excited when our trees arrived but they were slightly smaller than we thought. We had a discussion and decided that we needed to spend some of the money we have left on tree protectors to help them grow.We also spotted a deal on cheerios and send Mrs H off to Home Bargains to top up for our making session next week.
What did you learn this week?
We learnt that plans can change and we need to be adaptable. We applied our school values of perserverence and manners to keep up our advertising. We also learnt that sometimes things can come up we hadn’t budgeted for but sometimes we make savings too.
What did you find difficult this week?
This week plans had to change. We had many people wanting plaques and it was hard to keep track of.We decided on a finance team and also someone to oversee everything so things weren’t missed or lost
We need your help!
Our trees arrived
Making Love Bird Feeders
Making Seedy Feeders
Week 6
Tell us what you have been doing this week
This week we have been sooo busy making both types of bird feeders.we had to work as a team to thread cheerios for our love birds and stick seeds on to
We also voted a finance team to work with Mrs Bone in the office and she helped us make a spreadsheet. We have been round all the classes in school showing them what we have made and asking them to buy them. We updated our Facebook page.
We also started writing the long list of names to send to the people making the plaques.
We nreeded to keep our trees watered and safe ready to plant next week
What did you learn this week?
Lard makes our hall floor very slippery!!
That it’s really important to keep track of orders and what we are spending and getting in.
Advertising is the key.
What did you find difficult this week?
W needed lots of patience to thread the cheerios because they kept slipping off.
It was hard to decide how many to make as we didn’t want to waste anything but wanted to make sure we had enough.
Week 7
Tell us what you have been doing this week
This was the week we had all been waiting for - tree planting. We made sure they were deep enough and protected by the plastic shields. It was hard work doing all that digging! We wrote on the villages social media pages asking people to be careful and avoid the areas we had planted. We have been doing a roaring trade selling our birdfeeders to the community and our school mates. We had to chase up any tree pledges and the finance team worked with Mrs Bone in the office to try and balance the books. We had to organise all the names for our plaques and let the provider know.
What did you learn this week?
That digging is hard work! That working as a team was easier than working on your own. You needed 2 pairs of hands to get the tree in straight. We learn that sometimes you need to go with the majority when we were deciding where was best for the trees.
What did you find difficult this week?
People had paid in cash and bank transfer so we needed to be careful that we had everybody's orders right and hadn't missed anybody out. Deciding which trees to put where was tricky.
Tree planting
Tree planting
Talking to the project managers
Checking on how we have helped
Week 8
Tell us what you have been doing this week
This week we caught up with Izzy. We finalised the last of the tree orders and checked how the trees were doing. So far so good!. We decided to use up our last birdfeeders on the cycle path when we were doing our annual Reindeer Ramble.
Izzy had set us up a meeting with some project managers who told us how they plan and solve problems. We talked about how we had planned and had to change some things along the way.
Izzy talked about her job protecting the environment and we picked which of the Sustainable Development Goals we had met . We agreed we had definitely made a difference
What did you learn this week?
We learnt about how lots of countries had agreed on some goals to change our world for the better. We also learnt how big budgets could be in large companies. We couldn't believe some projects had billions!
What did you find difficult this week?
We had to chase up a couple of payments.We needed to decide on what to do with anything we had left like a box of cheerios and some seeds.We decided to sell it to school for breakfast club and science
Week 9
Tell us what you have been doing this week
This week we have been making our video. We worked together to come up with a plan and what people needed to say. We went back to the start and remembered all the fun we had. The tree plaques finally arrived so we were out in the field again to put them with the trees
What did you learn this week?
It was great to look back and see how far we had come and what we had achieved. WE DID IT !
What did you find difficult this week?
Not giggling when we were recording and remembering our lines. Fitting everything we had done in.
For pupils to answer:
In one sentence please tell us what bright stars has meant to you?
Bright Stars means we have helped other children in the hospice, wildlife and helped ourselves to know more about business and what we can do if we work together.
For teachers to answer:
Can you tell us the impact this programme has had on your school?
It’s been great to see the children become so passionate about improving the school grounds. They have learnt so many new skills such as persuasion in their adverts to securing the best value for any goods they needed. Their confidence has increased and as the weeks progressed they asked more meaningful questions to the contacts Izzy arranged to speak to from Bechtel Cavendish. Every week they eagerly waited for Izzy to arrive.
Please provide your business plan.
Please provide your marketing plan.
Please provide your finance report/template.
Charity name/money donated to.
We are going to donate 25% of our profits to Jigsaw Cumbia's Children Hospice and are using the remainder to further enhance our school outdoor area
Final profit (minus the £50 seed funding).
£1, 240.01
The long awaited plaques are here
The tree plaques are in the ground
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