43. Great Resources to Teach Kids How to Build a Business

Have you ever wondered how other kids started their business at a such young age? Do your kids also want to start their business but you don't know how to guide them? Do you and your kids have a lot of business ideas but do not which one is the best? Well, wether you guys have ideas or not, here are some great resources to help you (and your parents) to get started.

Free Guide Book

If your kid (student) is above age 12, you should totally get The Ultimate Young Entrepreneurs' Launch Starter Kit for them. If they are below age 12, you can read it first and then teach them how to go through the process. In this guidebook, I shared 10 steps to guide you through finding business ideas, talking to potential customers, and marketing products etc. If you need a hands-on guide book to help you teach kids how to launch a business, this is the FREE guide to go.

Also, if you haven't yet, listen to the full story at our Spark Creators Podcast episode 43. This is an opening of the following upcoming series: Businesses that Empowers Kid Entrepreneurs. We will be featuring the following guests and their businesses:

• 44. Brian Weisfeld: Founder of The Startup Squad

• 45. Patricia Clahar: Founder of Teaching Entrepreneurship for Kids

• 46. Jeannine Glista: Founder of BizKids.

• 47. Roxanne Christophe: Founder of Girls Crashing It

• 48-49 Tameka Montgomery: Founder of Raising Entrepreneurs

Organizations & Companies

Besides those businesses and founders who we have interviewed, here is also a list of companies and organizations that empowers young entrepreneurs. You may want to check them out just to see what programs or resources they offer.

Young Entrepreneurs Academy

The Young Entrepreneurs Academy is after school program that help middle or high school students between the ages of 11 and 18 who are interested in starting their own business . They have local chapters that so you may want to look for one in your area. They invite business guest lecturers, arrange dynamic field trips to local companies, and have pitch competition that supports the program. Students can learn how to develop and run a real business in a fun, projects-based approach.

Young Entrepreneur Institute

Young Entrepreneur Institute was founded by Greg Malkin in 2005 and launched its initial activities at University School in 2006. They provide young entrepreneurs train programs to students (K-12 Programs) and leverage the participation of the community of teachers, educators and entrepreneurship organizations. They also host a yearly Enspire Conference for educators and organizations.

Launch X

Launch X is an intensive summer entrepreneurship program that helps high school students build a thriving business. Throughout the program, you will be challenged to identify promising market opportunities while building entrepreneurial skills and mindset. They collaborate with top universities like MIT, University of Pennsylvania and Northwestern University to offer on-site training experience for students. It is pricy and the average cost for tuition alone is around $8000. You also have to count in travel expenses if you do plan to participate their programs.

Venture Lab

Venture Lab was founded in 2013 by Cristal Glangchaito to teach kids, especially girls embrace their creativity and cultivate an entrepreneurial mindset. They have a program that teaches girls to come up with problems, create a product, test in the market and iterate the final products. Now they are open their entrepreneurial education for all youth by offering open-access curriculum. Whether you are a parent or educator, anyone can access their resources and use them to help teaching kids about creativity and entrepreneurship.

Kid Entrepreneurship

Kid Entrepreneurship is an online platform that provides affordable Entrepreneurship STEM education for K-8 schools. Their programs are like 8-16 days short trainings that has free previews available. Anyone interested in their programs can purchase it for $100 for every students and teachers from a specific school. One interesting thing that's worth to mention is their Kids Business Ideas page. If you are looking for some sort of ideas to get started, definitely visit their page to get some inspirations.

Those are my top 5 recommendations if you want to check them out. Here are some additional businesses that empower kids entrepreneurship if you want to take a look.

• Teaching Kids Business

• Youth Entrepreneurs

• Biz World

Books

Now let's take a look of books you can get to help you through your entrepreneurship journey. These books are either written by our podcast guests, or recommended by them. I have also personally purchased several out of the list.

The Startup Squad

The Startup Squad, written by Brian Weisfeld and Nicole C. Kear, is a book series that promotes the belief that entrepreneurship can empower young girls to develop important life skills, follow their passions, and reach their potential. If you are a parent of girl(s) reading this, definitely get a copy to start encouraging your daughter to start thinking about their passion and potential.

How to Turn 1 Hundred into 1 Million

How to Turn $100 into $1,000,000: Earn! Save! Invest!, written by James McKenna and Jeannine Glista is a book teaching kids about money, investment and business.

Jeannine was on our podcast and her business BizKids also has a lot of video teaching kids about earning, spending, saving and investment. If you want to get started with free video training, check out BizKids' show.

Entrepreneur Kid

Entrepreneur Kid is a book series that showcases the true stories of four real kid entrepreneurs who have started and continue to manage real businesses. Follow along as Sebastian Martinez, Gabby Goodwin, Jason Li, and Rachel Zietz become Entrepreneur Kids. Written by Erica Swallow and illustrated by myself, the series is a wonderful tool for introducing young children (Age 3-7) to the concepts of entrepreneurship, perseverance, creative thinking, and philanthropy. Pick up a book or the entire series to get your kids excited about entrepreneurship!

Kid Startup: How You Can Be an Entrepreneur

Kid Startup: How You can Be an Entrepreneur, written by Mark Cuban and Shaan Patel, is a book that give kids ideas, example and inspirations about building a business. They even have step-by-step guide when it comes to making a specific product. It is easy to follow and the product ideas are low budget so you can start one as soon as possible.

Girls Who Run the World: 31 CEOs Who Mean Business

Girls Who Run the World: 31 CEOs Who Mean Business is a book recommended by one of our podcast guest Roxanne Christophe. The book is written by Diana Kapp and illustrated by Bijou Karman. They have 31 real examples of women who run biotech companies, online fashion sites, environmental enterprises etc. It definitely provides girls of all ages the role models to look up to and encourages all girls to turn their ideas into reality and break barriers in the business world.

The following are some other books you may want to check out that are related to youth entrepreneurship. Hope you and your kids can find one that suits your need.

• Venture Girls

• Kidpreneurs: Young Entrepreneurs With Big Ideas!

• The Beginner Entrepreneur: Guide to How Your Idea for a New Startup Business From Home Can Go from Zero to Profitable FAST (The DIY Entrepreneur)

• KidCEO: Amazing Kids Share Their Success in Business

• Start Your Own Kid Focused Business and More: Party Planning, Cooking Classes, Gift and Bath Products, Plus-Sized Clothing, Educational Toys and G (StartUp Series)

• The Big Startup Guidebook for Kids: A Principle-Based Approach to Entrepreneurship

Podcast

Spark Creators

I am sure you are familiar with Spark Creators if you come to our site from my podcast. Spark Creators features young and adult creators, entrepreneurs and change makers on a weekly basis. In Spark Creators, I share practical tips for kids and parents who are interested in building a business. Sometimes we also have educator and business owners come to talk about trendy issues in nowadays education.

Raising Entrepreneurs

Raising Entrepreneurs is a podcast hosted by Tameka Montgomery, the last guest we will be featuring in the "Businesses that Empowers Kid Entrepreneurs" series. This show is mainly for parents and give them ideas and inspirations to raise creative entrepreneurs. Similar to my own experience, Tameka talked to dozens of entrepreneurs and you will find her podcast very informative. Feel free to go to her website and listen to all the 80+ episodes.

How I Built This

How I Built This is a podcast recommended by one of our podcast guest Roxanne Christophe. Roxanne says she listen with her daughters and find it inspirational to hear other founders and business owners story. Hosted by Guy Raz, he dives into the stories behind some of the world's best known companies. The most recent episodes are Lulu Lemon, Eventbrite and Panera Bread. "How I Built This weaves a narrative journey about innovators, entrepreneurs and idealists—and the movements they built."

Dream Big Podcast

Dream Big Podcast is hosted by a kid creator - Eva Karpman, a 9 year old girl. This podcast encourages kids and adults o pursue their passions in life and take action to make their dream come true. I listened to Eva's show right when I started my own podcast. It is inspirational to me that how dedicated and consistent Eva is about her show. She interviewed some of the greatest achievers from different fields like Cobe Bryant, Devon Franklin and Kyle Maynard. If you are also thinking about starting a podcast, check out Eva's show and see how she talks to people from all over the world.

Side Hustles School

Side Hustles School is a podcast for adult entrepreneurs. But as someone who is also a side hustler, I highly recommend parents to give it a listen. First the show is very short, you can get a lot of ideas by listen to 3-5 episodes. That's why they have over a thousand of episodes already produced over the past 4 years. The reason why seeing a kid's business as side hustles is that kids' full time job is going to school. They also have to balance between school, business and play if they want to build something on the side. So, maybe you will find these ideas from the Side Hustle School feasible for your and your kids as a side hustler.

Youtube Channel

Shark Tank

Shark Tank is the best show to watch together with your kids if you got some time. They have many young entrepreneurs going on the show alone or with their parents. Simply watching how other kids dare to be out there and showcase their ideas and businesses is encouraging. In fact, on Spark Creators, I have also interviewed two guests (Jason Li and Moziah Bridges) who went to Shark Tank and got their funding or mentors. If you want to encourage your kids to get on Shark Tank someday, prepare them by watching the show first.

Young Entrepreneurs Forum

Young Entrepreneur Forum is an online community & media site where people can learn all about business opportunities, business education and entrepreneurship. I just found out this channel recently. Over the past 3 years, it builds an audience of 577K on Youtube so it should be quite credible. Their video is around 2-10min long and has visual hand drawing going along with the audio. It is easy to understand and consume.

How to Make Money As A Kid

Created by Steve (cannot find his last name lol), How To Make Money As A Kid provides weekly video and gives kid and teen great ideas to make money. Steve also started Cash Academy, an online platform helping kids and teens make money to have the independence of an adult. Similar like the videos from Young Entrepreneurs Forum, Steve's video is also using visual drawing while he talks, which helps remembering the points from the video.

Tanner Planes

Tanner Planes is a high school entrepreneur whose Youtube Channel has over 89K subscribers. He actually has his own e-commerce store and has hit his six-figure store selling from Instagram. He also has a lot of insights into Facebook Ads and shares all of his stories and experience through his Youtube. If you want to find a real Youtuber entrepreneur example, check out Tanner Planes's channel for e-commerce and marketing tips.

Ken

Even though this Youtube creator's channel - Ken only has 7 videos, he made 55K+ people follow him on Youtube. His video is well shot and edited. On top of that, he seemed has great personality that can attract a lot of audiences. You may not be able to find a lot of good content from his channel, but I just think he is a great example of young entrepreneurs who use Youtube as a channel to start a business.

This is the full guide of this article, which includes a free Starter Kit for Young Entrepreneurs, top recommendations for businesses, books, podcast and youtube channels in the field. I really hope these resources can help you kick start your ideas, or at least keep you thinking and feeling inspired to pursue what you are passionated about.