martinzoo

Do I sound pathetic if I admit that I am obsessed with this little simulated business game?

Johnny Money

Jabem and I were playing on one computer and GB was on the other one. GB finished his game while Jabem and I were unable to finish because we both had obligations elsewhere to finish. But I want to go back and see if it’s even possible to beat GB. He began the game with $50,000 and 24 months later (each month is like a level with different challenges and consequenses) he ended the game with over 71,000,000!

From the web site:

Johnny Money Online Game is a FREE Internet-based small business simulation game that engages students as they explore the risks and rewards of business ownership. It was created for the NFIB (National Federation of Independent Business). The game’s length is a minimum of 45 minutes, and it can be paused at any point to provide multiple completion options–complete it in one day or spread it out over a few days.

Goals/Objectives: Students will be able to:

•  Utilize experiential learning as a tool to aid in retention of entrepreneurial concepts
• Create, maintain, analyze and influence the essential factors in a successful virtual small business
• Experience, engage and interact with entrepreneurial decisions and events in a virtual setting

This is like the Lemonade Stand game, which is also fun, but not on the level of this game. The lemonade stand is great for smaller kids. Johnny Money is intended for 13 years and up, but I fudged GB’s age and let him give it a go.

It’s good to play alongside your child because there were several things that I had to explain to GB in order for him to understand long-term business decisions.

Go ahead. Give it a try. It’s cool. You’ll like it!

Last night GB and I watched the new show, ‘My Dad is Better than your Dad!’ To me, it was very Nickelodeon-ish, but GB thought it was great. And he was positive that HIS dad would do better than THOSE dads.

He doesn’t watch much tv. He loves movies, but not tv. It’s a weird idiosyncrasy that he possesses. So it was strange to watch him be excited about a tv show. He hated it constantly being interrupted by commercials, though……. Don’t we all? I guess I’ll have to set my DVR next week so we can skip them.

The first couple of segments are agility and strength competitions and we both figured that dh would have an edge up on these guys because he is very athletic. And being a lawyer with many different interests would have helped him a lot in the smarts categories. There was also a segment where Dad had to put his head in an aquarium filled with LIVE snakes and bob for tomatoes…. YUCK! We figured Dad wouldn’t like it, but would ultimately do it, and do it well.

But we were curious about the last segment. The segment that proves that you know your kid well. So while he was at the Y working out, we copied down the questions from the show, and GB answered them as if he were on the show. Then we waited till Dad came home and sprung them on him.

1. What is GB’s favorite tv show? (This one is hard because, as I said above, he doesn’t watch much tv, but he does get me to tape a few shows) I gave Dad these choices: a) Mythbusters b) Animal Precinct c) Sarah Conner Chronicles d) Man vs. Wild
2. Who is GB’s favorite actor? a) Keanu Reeves b) Arnold Schwarzenegger c) Mel Gibson d) none of these
3. Which movie, with that actor, is GB’s favorite? a) Kindergarten Cop b) Total Recall c) Conan the Barbarian d) The Terminator
4. If Hollywood was making a movie about GB’s dad, who would be the star?
5. What does GB like the best about his mom? a) she’s funny b) she’s a good cook c) she’s smart d) she’s a good driver

Answers: c, b, d, Harrison Ford (GB didn’t know his name - he called him Han Solo….LOL), and c

So which ones did Dad get right? First of all, he was very amused by the whole concept. And he agreed that the first question was a tough one. In fact, he got it wrong, because GB has only watched one episode of the Sarah Conner Chronicles. But apparently he loved it. He breezed through the next three questions, earning a pretend $30,000. But blew the last question by saying I was a good cook, which I am, but with GB’s vegetarianism, he eats a lot of raw stuff, so he considers that not cooking.

Since the Dad on tv only got $20,000., we figured that GB’s Dad IS better than his Dad!

Here are some cute little games that are on the show’s web site.

I wasn’t going to go out and vote today….

But GB made me.

He’s so funny! He saw somebody with one of those ‘I voted’ stickers. And he looked at me and said, “When are we going to go vote?”

So what could I do? I don’t want my child to think that I think it’s unimportant. How could I tell him that I have NEVER voted in a primary. I was actually worried that it would be different from a traditional election. *blushing*

But it wasn’t. It was easy. And everyone in the polling station was as sweet as could be towards GB. They could tell how interested he was. He’s been with me every time I’ve voted for President, Governor, or Senator. But he’s always excited to go. And this time, they let him put the ballot in the counting machine!

We both left with our ‘I voted’ stickers.

When we got home we checked out these sites online.

Congress for Kids

Scholastic

Project Vote Smart

Be the Nominee ~ This game was pretty fun. Before you can get elected, you first have to get nominated. Answer presidential questions to see if you have what it takes to earn your party’s big prize. Each correct answer brings you one step closer to the nomination, but each wrong answer brings your opponent Dirk Soundbyte one step closer to HIS shot at the White House.

Every year that we’ve been homeschooling, GB’s birthday has fallen on a week day. And every year I have given him the day off for his birthday, to play. Because there should be some perks to learning at home, right? Except this year. This year his birthday fell on the weekend.

And guess what? I forgot the deal!

Since we finished his fourth grade math course last week, I thought I’d make today fun. And I had lots of games planned to play. We had been playing for about an hour when GB shyly asked me why he didn’t get a day off for his birthday. Awww!

I felt bad, because it hadn’t even entered my mind. Birthday was over…… (until next weekend when he has his little kid party)…….. So, you know what I did?

You got it! I gave him the rest of the day off.

We were having fun, too. But hey, a deal’s a deal.

Before he went off to play, though, we had found some really cool online math games.

This one works on learning about angles. And it was pretty fun.

This one was good, because it helped you learn grid skills. Plus it introduced negative numbers on a grid, which we’ve never covered. But he handled the concept with ease.

This one is called Multiflyer, and it helped with his multiplication skills.

We didn’t actually get to play anything on this site. Well…… actually, I did. I played  Yahtzee …. shhhhh! But it had some fun games on it, so we’ll probably come back some other time.