We can’t all be together in person during this time of social distancing, but there are plenty of ways to have fun, continue learning, and take part in Girl Scouts!
Developing financial literacy and confidence in money matters is something that’ll last your Girl Scout a lifetime! There are age-appropriate activities to help every girl her set goals, manage money, and let her be her own boss!
The activities below have been adapted from existing Girl Scout programming and optimized for use at home during a period of social distancing.
Business Owner Badge—Step 1 (Juniors)
Purpose: Girls explore business ideas they might like to start one day.
Setup: All businesses start with an idea. To bring your idea to life, you will need to learn about consumer research, offering great customer service, and more. Let’s start by coming up with your own business idea. In this activity, you will explore your interests, hobbies, and talents.
Activity: Make a list of your top interests, hobbies, and talents, and then select one that you could imagine turning into a business. On a blank sheet of paper, write that interest in the middle, then think of all the business ideas you can relate to that topic. For example, pet lovers might think about working as a pet groomer, veterinarian, pet-store owner, or dog trainer. Ask your family to help you think of new ideas if you get stuck. Then talk to them about what training or education you might need to run this business. With adult help, look for answers to your questions online.
This activity was adapted from the Business Owner badge booklet: page 2, step 1.
Financing My Dreams—Step 1 (Cadettes)
Purpose: Girls will discover some of their dream jobs by exploring their interests, talents, skills, and hobbies as they look to their bright futures.
Setup: Have you ever wondered what your life will be like when you are 20 or 30? What will your job be? Where will you live? The Financing My Dreams badge lets you explore, practice thinking about your future, and learn how much that future might cost. In this activity, you will explore your hobbies, interests, skills, and talents; learn about jobs related to your interests; and discover what those jobs pay.
Activity: First you’ll create a vision board about your future. Cut out pictures and words from a magazine that represent you and your dreams. If you don’t have any magazines, you can draw your vision or search online for images—or your vision board could be a mixture of drawing, writing, and collage. As you create your vision board, make sure you include some of your current hobbies, interests, skills, and talents.
Now it’s time to dig into your dream jobs. Do you have any interests, hobbies, skills, or talents that you could turn into a career? Make a list of possible jobs—see if you can get at least 25 possibilities written down. You might need some help making your list. Look to books, TV, websites, news, and other outlets for inspiration, or have your friends and family help you brainstorm a list of ideas. With the help of an adult, you can also connect with adults in your network to learn about their job history.
Once you have your list, pick your top five choices. Finally, search the internet to find a rough estimate of the salary and take-home pay for each job. Salary refers to how much money you’ll bring home each year and take-home pay is your salary minus taxes and other benefits like health insurance that you may pay for before getting paid yourself.
Adapted from Step 1 of the Cadette Financing My Dreams badge.
Head here to explore more entrepreneur activities for the Girl Scout in your life.
Looking for even more ways to increase financial literacy? Here are more badge activities* you can print out and do at home:
- Money Counts – Daisies
- Money Manager – Brownies
- Savvy Shopper – Juniors
- Comparison Shopping – Cadettes
- Buying Power – Seniors
- Good Credit – Ambassadors
*All badges may not be available until late summer/early fall.
