Peer Review

Lemonade Stand

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Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:: This module has players ‘run’ a lemonade stand for 30 days with the intent of accumulating money and not going bankrupt. The mirror site url provides a list of past players performance as well as a link to a players message board.
Type of Material:: Simulation
Recommended Uses:: To have any learning potential the instructor must monitor each simulation and require students to explicitly track information.
Technical Requirements:: Internet access is required and a browser.
Identify Major Learning Goals:: To learn about all aspects of running a business, such as purchasing, volume discounts, tracking profit and costs.
Target Student Population:: Elementary age students through junior high.
Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:: Students must understand the concepts of profit, revenues, costs, and volume discounts.

Rating:
Strengths:: Players purchase ice cubes, sugar, lemons, and cups. They determine the selling price for the product, the number of lemons and cups of sugar to be used for each pitcher of lemonade, as well as the number of ice cubes per cups. The game is colorful and catches one's attention.
Concerns:: While the directions are somewhat clear, concepts are not demonstrated or summarized well. The module is not at all self-contained. Important terms are not defined nor are the relationships between cost and profits explained. The resulting level of satisfaction makes no sense (ie, 0 product so 0 sales to almost 200 customers resulted in a 50% satisfaction rate?) The amount of sugar and lemons that makes a desirable product seems to be a guessing game. One is left to wonder whether any algorithms used to determine success are informed by scholarship.

Rating:
Strengths:: It could be used briefly in a class.
Concerns:: No objectives or prerequisite knowledge is specified. It would appear that this simulation is designed primarily to be a game rather than a learning tool. Relationships between concepts are not readily apparent and thus would be difficult to tie to cost/volume/profit analysis and pricing strategies. It is unclear which elements of the game are due to chance versus application of business skills. Unless students keep records and track information over a large number of simulations, little learning potential seems evident. Any information entered is simply a guess. Too many variables change at one time making incorporation as a classroom activity a complex endeavor.

Rating:
Strengths:: The game is colorful and initially engaging. Interactivity is also high. Graphics are nice.
Concerns:: To begin play, one must click twice on the green button. While instructions do exist, they seem incomplete. Instructions should be inherent in the simulation. The game is confusing and it is unclear how to play it effectively. Game window is too small to permit projection in a classroom. Design quality is low from an educational standpoint.

Other Issues and Comments:: Considerable experimentation would be required to determine how to use this module to enhance learning. Potential exists, but it is not readily apparent.
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