Business and economics
Business model canvas
Map how a proposed small enterprise creates, provides and pays for value, then test a risky assumption. The landscape A4 workbook includes a nine-block canvas, a fictional school-bakes example and prompts for risk, payer, pitch and revision.
Read the material
Map how a proposed small enterprise creates, provides and pays for value, then test a risky assumption. The landscape A4 workbook includes a nine-block canvas, a fictional school-bakes example and prompts for risk, payer, pitch and revision.
Complete resource. Use the preview for diagrams and layout.
Page 1
NAME CLASS DATE Your idea. Name a business or school mini-enterprise: Fill each block of the canvas1 with short phrases. Start with Customer segments, then Value propositions. Page 2 shows a model. KEY PARTNERS Who helps us? Which suppliers or helpers do we rely on? KEY ACTIVITIES What must we do each day to make this work? KEY RESOURCES What do we need to have: people, things, money? VALUE PROPOSITIONS What problem do we solve? What do customers get? CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS How do we keep customers happy and coming back? CHANNELS How do customers find us and buy from us? CUSTOMER SEGMENTS Who are our customers? Name one group. COST STRUCTURE What do we spend money on? REVENUE STREAMS How does money come in? Who pays for what? 1 Layout adapted from the Business Model Canvas (Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur, Business Model Generation, 2010) Business model canvas · Page 1 of 3 BUSINESS AGES 14 TO 18 CANVAS Business model canvas
Page 2
Class Lantern Bakes is a fictional school mini-enterprise selling cakes at break time. It is invented for this sheet. Read each block of the canvas1, then answer the questions below. KEY PARTNERS School kitchen team KEY ACTIVITIES Baking, selling KEY RESOURCES Ingredients, a table, a float VALUE PROPOSITIONS Fresh, affordable treats made by students CUSTOMER RELATIONSHIPS Friendly service, regular days CHANNELS A stall at break CUSTOMER SEGMENTS Students and staff COST STRUCTURE Ingredients, packaging REVENUE STREAMS Sales LOOK CLOSELY Who pays? Name one cost and its block. Which block would you improve? WHO PAYS? A COST IMPROVE 1 Layout adapted from the Business Model Canvas (Alexander Osterwalder and Yves Pigneur, Business Model Generation, 2010) Business model canvas · Page 2 of 3 BUSINESS AGES 14 TO 18 CANVAS Worked example: Class Lantern Bakes
Page 3
NAME CLASS DATE 1 Riskiest assumption Look at your page 1 canvas. RISKIEST BLOCK WHY RISKY? 2 Who pays? Is it the same person who uses it? WHO PAYS 3 What could go wrong? Name a problem and a fix. RISK AND FIX 4 One-sentence pitch Fill the gaps in your own words. We help who want by 5 Improve it One change, then re-check. CHANGE I WILL MAKE Business model canvas · Page 3 of 3 BUSINESS AGES 14 TO 18 QUESTIONS Test your canvas
A teaching sequence
Describe the main parts of a business model and identify an assumption or risk that needs testing.
Define customer and value
Define one customer group and the value the enterprise proposes to offer; add short phrases to the canvas blocks.
Which customer problem does your proposed offer address?
Connect the canvas blocks
Work across partners, activities, resources, relationships and channels, then record costs and revenue.
Who pays, and which resources create a cost?
Question the fictional example
Read Class Lantern Bakes as a fictional example; identify who pays, a cost and a block that could be improved.
Which block in Class Lantern Bakes needs more information?
Test the riskiest assumption
Return to the pupil’s own canvas, name its riskiest assumption, distinguish payer from user if needed and write a one-sentence pitch. Choose a small test for the riskiest assumption.
What evidence would show that a customer wants this offer?
Before you teach
Look for the thinking behind an answer, choose the support your class needs and leave room for an independent response.
What to look for
Look for a plausible link between customer, value, activities, resources, costs and revenue, then an assumption that can be tested. Ask: “What evidence would show that this customer wants the offer?” Class Lantern Bakes is explicitly fictional and should not be mistaken for a real enterprise example.
Give a little support
Use the fictional example to teach one block at a time, then provide word prompts such as people, tasks, materials, payments and costs. Pupils can sketch or discuss an idea before writing in the canvas.
Take the idea further
Ask pupils to identify the highest-risk assumption and design a small, ethical way to learn about it before spending money. They can revise one canvas block using what they find and explain how the change affects costs or value.
Things to keep in mind
The worked example is explicitly invented, and its details should stay separate from real school activity. The canvas is a planning framework, not financial, legal or market advice. The layout attribution and usage rights need review before publication.
Keep the idea. Make it yours.
Bring your topic, learning goal and class context to PLAI™, then review what you create.
Ideas to try with your class
Sample teaching perspectives on what to try, what to adapt and what to watch for.
Meet The Creators
Meet a creator whose teaching interests connect with this template.
Five More Minutes
The first page gives nine business-model blocks and asks learners to start with customer segments and value propositions. A fictional cake stall on page 2 fills the blocks, then asks who pays, what costs money and which block to improve.
Bright Idea Break
For ages 14 to 18, the three-page canvas links customers, offer, partners, activities, resources, relationships, channels, costs and revenue. The example gives a shared case before pupils plan their own business or school mini-enterprise.
Margin Note
The instruction to use short phrases can keep the nine-box canvas manageable. Working through the Class Lantern Bakes example first gives a concrete way to distinguish a customer group from a channel or a revenue stream.
Chalk & Chai
The cake-stall case is invented, and its brief outline is not evidence that the model would be viable. A next step should test assumptions about demand, costs and school permissions with relevant real information.