Bake Sale Maths

It's the end of term and we had so much fun with our 'Bake Sale Maths' projects! Students worked together in teams to research a product that they would like to bake and "sell" in a classroom bake sale (using play money). They needed to visit grocery shops online to calculate the total cost for ingredients, work out how much they would charge per item and present their initial proposal to the 'bank manager' to apply for a loan.

Once their initial plans were approved, they needed to produce a persuasive marketing campaign for their 'company'. Some students made advertising posters or powerpoint presentations for their campaign, others created television advertisements using a green screen and DoInk app.

They then "purchased" their ingredients, made their products and set up shop. We used play money for their cash registers and each student was given a certain amount of money to spend on other stores. The rule was that they could only buy one of their own products and the rest had to be bought from other groups. We had students from other classes come along as extra customers. Half way through the sale I asked them to offer a certain % discount on items they had left. At the end of the sale they needed to calculate total profit (minus any initial costs) and evaluate the success of their business strategies.

It was such an engaging way to differentiate for varying student needs and they were all motivated to keep learning. Their only complaint was that profits were fake money. Great way to end the term!