Slide outline for Lesson 7.9. Twelve slides, one day. Slide 4 (the six parts with seconds) stays up for the rest of the unit; it is the structure judges are briefed on and the structure criterion 6 scores.
The Elevator Pitch
- Unit 7, Lesson 7.9, Topic 7.2 FACS Shark Tank
- Sixty seconds is not a short speech
- It is six pieces in a fixed order
Teacher notes
Image: a closed elevator door.
Team folders with the signed numbers page out. No team drafts a pitch without its numbers, because the money is part 5. Have a prop in hand for the model pitch.
Do now
- In ONE sentence, tell me what your team is selling
- Write it. You get one sentence
Teacher notes
Take five out loud and do not correct any of them. Write on the board only what was missing across all five: usually "who has the problem" and "what it costs." Students keep their sentence and read it again at the end of the period.
Time me.
- I am going to try to make you want to give me money
- In sixty seconds
Teacher notes
Hand a stopwatch to one student. Deliver the model pitch cold, all six parts, and stop at 60. Time yourself before class. If your model runs 85 seconds, every team will run 85 seconds and pitch day falls apart.
The six parts
| # | Part | Seconds |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hook | 10 |
| 2 | Problem | 10 |
| 3 | Solution | 15 |
| 4 | Who it is for | 10 |
| 5 | The money | 10 |
| 6 | The ask | 5 |
Teacher notes
The reason this works: the person listening knows what is coming next. Students copy the six parts and the seconds, then mark which part their own idea is weakest on.
What each part has to contain
- Hook: a question or a number. Not a greeting. Not "so, basically"
- Problem: the problem, and who has it
- Solution: what you make or do, and one thing that makes it different
- Who it is for: the customer profile in one sentence, plus a real quote
- The money: unit cost, price, and break-even, in one sentence
- The ask: what you want. Specific. With a number
Teacher notes
One line each, ten seconds each. The money and the ask are the two parts students will try to skip, so say both twice.
Again, slower. Name each part.
Teacher notes
Deliver the model pitch a second time and stop after each part so the class names it. Do not tell them; ask them.
Lands and Kills
| LANDS | KILLS |
|---|---|
Teacher notes
Open the two columns empty and fill them with student answers. Steer the Kills column to the real ones. This list becomes the peer review criteria tomorrow, and students who wrote the criteria enforce them harder than criteria you hand them.
Now watch me do it badly.
- Fifteen seconds
- Three of the things on your Kills list
Teacher notes
Read off the paper. Look at the floor. Say "um so basically." Mumble the price. Let the room name all three. This is worth more than any explanation.
Draft it. Write it the way you will SAY it.
- CEO writes the hook and the ask
- CFO writes the money sentence
- CMO writes the who-it-is-for sentence
- All three write the problem and the solution together
- Every member writes the whole thing on their own sheet
Teacher notes
Circulate with one question: "Say the hook to me right now." Out-loud words, not essay words. If you would not say it to a person, do not write it.
Asks a school could actually say yes to
- "$20.00 of supplies from the FACS budget so we can make the first ten"
- "A table at the spring event so we can sell forty"
- "Permission to run this for one week in June"
- "Ten pre-orders so we know it is worth making"
- Not an ask: "please support us," "what do you think," "we hope you like it"
Teacher notes
This is where middle schoolers are weakest, because nobody has ever taught them to ask for something specific. Read all four.
Time it. Twice.
- Read it out loud at your table while a teammate times you
- Write both times on the sheet
- If you are over 60: cut words from the HOOK and the SOLUTION
- You do NOT cut the money and you do NOT cut the ask
Teacher notes
Every team over time will try to cut the numbers first, because the numbers are the hardest part to say. That is exactly why they stay. Then walk to every team and say two words: "Hook. Go." The CEO delivers the hook alone, from memory.
Hook round
- Every CEO. Ten seconds. Around the room
- No comment. No ranking
Teacher notes
Ten hooks back to back in under two minutes. The difference between a good one and a weak one is obvious with no teacher commentary at all, which is why this is better than a discussion. Collect nothing; everything goes in the team folder.