14 Best Games To Educate Your Children About Business

Caught playing games with his nieces!

I found this list of 14 games on Sparkplugging, a website that you’ll find more great information about starting a home business. Started by Wendy Piersall, it was originally a website just for moms starting a business, but when she realized that the bulk of her readers were men, she changed her look to accommodate everyone.

These 14 educational games are classics, and I’ve talked about several of them before. Since many of you are still looking for Christmas presents for your children that will last longer than a day, I thought you’d like a list to take to the store. I’m a big believer in incorporating educational games into the school routine, and games about business were always big at our house!

A heads up on the game, The Sims 2: Open For Business, it’s an expansion pack, with a “T” rating. When we bought this game we were really excited, yet learned to read the fine print BEFORE I leave the store from now on.  I was so glad when my game-savvy older son informed his not-so-game-savvy mom that you need the original Sims 2 game to play this particular “expansion pack” (I had no idea what that meant, but it wasn’t clear on the package to someone like me that you needed something else to make this game work!).

Thankfully, we had not opened the game yet and were able to return it. Maybe we’ll tackle the entire set next year . . . although I also noticed (again, after the fact) that there was a “T” rating, which included the warning of “Crude humor, sexual themes, violence” – so maybe NOT.

Many of the games referred to are available as a download, at a much more reasonable price than most of the board games this year. There are many business-type games you can try over at Gamehouse (one of the few game sites of this type that Cnet deems safe) and they can be purchased to keep for as little as $6.99.   Signing up for the free trial allows you to try any of their games for 60 minutes, and as a thank you for trying them out, they give you one full featured game to keep. Of course, they hope that you continue paying the monthly fee, and we did do that last year for a few months and came away with several games that my younger son still plays. Jane’s Hotel and Diner Dash are two of his favorites, but there are many more sophisticated business related games available there. Most of the “tycoon” games are available, and I really liked being able to try many of the games online without having to download them onto our computer first.

While you’re over at Sparkplugging, be sure to sign up for their  FREE 21-Page Internet Business Idea Guide. We plan on covering the ‘how-to’ of many of those ideas next year. Make 2010 your year to finally get that online business started!

Read all 14 games at http://www.sparkplugging.com/sparkplug-ceo/14-educational-games-to-teach-your-kids-about-business/

Answer 3 quick survey questions for Wendy and get her ” Top Ten Marketing Mistakes Made by Home Business Entrepreneurs!” That’s something we SHOULD cover next year! Can you tell I have big plans for next year?

Do any of you have a game you’ve found that has good “business educational” value? Would love to hear!

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