creating a personal budget assignment

7/22/2019 Creating a Personal Budget Assignment

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Creating a Personal Budget

Class: Personal Finance 30 Teacher: Mr. McLauchlin

The Big Idea: Your financial world is a mix of incomes, required expenses, optional expenses, fixed and

variable expenses, as well as, savings and investments. It is how you plan for these items that will allow

you to achieve your financial goals and personal financial growth. A budget is a great financial planning

tool, and must be monitored, maintained, adapted and reflected upon to be successful.

Essential Question: How can I use a budget in my personal life to help me achieve my short-term and

long-term financial goals?

Assignment: You will create a budget for your personal income, expenses, savings and investments,

based on the real world numbers from your everyday life. This budget will be in the same format as we

discussed in class, and used in the sample budget. You will need to track your income, spending, saving

and investing for each week and compare it to the weekly budget you created, examining the variances.

You will also examine this data for a monthly period as well. You will be required to keep four

spreadsheets for this class, one due in each of the coming four months, covering a four-week period.The budget spreadsheets MUST include the following, but are by no means limited to this list:

1) A weekly budget for each of the 4 weeks in the period2) Actual data for each of the 4 weeks in the period3) The variances for each week between the budget and actual numbers4) A monthly total budget column5) A monthly total actual amount column6) A monthly total variance amount column7) Your reoccurring or regular income8) Your irregular income, such as gifts


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8) Your irregular income, such as gifts

The actual blog posts, which will occur weekly, will have several components.

The first part of your weekly blog/vlog (video blog), will answer - what changes did I need to make tomy budget this week and why?As mentioned there will always be unexpected conditions, it is how we

handle those conditions that is ultimately important.

The second part of the post will include a brief reflection about your spending/saving for the week. How

hard was it to stay on budget? Did you stay on budget? Were there any unexpected expenses that

arose? Did you make more/less income than you thought? What factors were pulling you off budget

and how did you respond? These are all meant as guiding questions, with the purpose of getting you to

think about your actual budget for the last week -- you may answer some, all or different questions

entirely in your reflection.

The third and final part of your weekly post will involve business and finance in general. You are asked

to comment on something that you learned in the last week about personal finance or business in

general.This can be something you learned in class, something you read in the news or in social media,

something you experienced, or something you want to know more about -- the point is for you to think

about what you learned and be able to explain that to me and the rest of your blog readers. You may

want to consider the following prompts when writing this portion: This week I learned.../I read this

article about personal finance.../I was involved in this financial situation.../I need more information

about.../I read or watched this business story.../My favourite thing from this week's class was... etc.

Again, the prompts are only meant to provide you a starting point. Do not feel constrained to using

them.

Both the spreadsheets, and the weekly blog posts, will be required for this assignment. You may want torefer to financial items in general on your post, but you do not have to. For example, instead of saying, I

got paid 300$ this week, which is 50$ less than I was expecting,you could just say, I got paid 50$ less

than I was expecting which negatively impacted my budget


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Creating a Personal Budget Rubric

Teacher Name: Mr. McLauchlin Student Name: ________________________________________

CATEGORY /50 9-10 Excellent 7-8 Proficient 5-6 Fair Below 5 Limited

Budget Elements

(Income, Variable Expenses,

Fixed Expense, Required

Expenses, Optional Expenses,

and Savings)

/10

Student includes all required

elements of the budget for

each week and the monthly

total, using a format similar to

that used in class. Budget is

clear and easy to read, and all

elements are expertly

addressed.

Student includes all required

elements of the budget for

each week and the monthly

total. Budget is clear and easy

to read, and all elements are

addressed.

Student includes most of the

required elements of the

budget for each week and the

monthly total. Budget is mostly

clear and can be understood.

Elements are missing from the

budget or complete periods

are absent from the budget

altogether. Budget is not clear

and is hard to understand.

Actual Data & Variances /10 Detailed records of the actual

earnings, savings and spending

for the student is recorded, and

these values are very clear in

the spreadsheet. Variances are

present, easy to find and

connected to the related data.

Record of the actual earnings,

savings and spending for the

student is recorded, and these

values are included in the

spreadsheet. Variances are

present, easy to find and

connected to the related data.

Records of the actual earnings,

savings and spending for the

student is recorded, and these

values are included in the

spreadsheet. Variances may be

absent from all or some of the

spreadsheet.

Actual data is either not

present or it is unclear what

the data is and how it relates

to the budget.

Goal Setting and Reflection /10 Goals are clearly defined on the

spreadsheet and are Specific,

Measurable, Attainable,

Relevant and Time-Bound.

These goals are thoughtfully

reflected upon in the blog

posts.

Goals are clearly defined on the

spreadsheet. These goals are

reflected upon in the blog

posts.

Goals are defined on the

spreadsheet but may not have

been reflected upon in the blog

posts.

Little to no thought was given

to goal setting or goals were

not created.

Budget Maintenance and

Adaptation /10

Through the blog posts, it is

extremely clear that thestudent has thoroughly

examined and adapted the

budget, based on events and

new knowledge.


clear that the student hasexamined and adapted the

budget, based on events and

new knowledge.


clear that the student hasexamined and adapted the

budget, but it is not clear why

this was done.

The student did not adapt the

budget based on events or newknowledge or the student did

not create a post to indicate

these adaptations.

Budget Reflection and Real-

World Learning /10

The students' reflection of

his/her budget was thoughtful

and relevant. The reflection

shows detailed connections to

class material or real-world

events.


his/her budget was thoughtful

and relevant. The reflection

shows some connections to

class material or real-world

events.


his/her budget was somewhat

thoughtful and relevant. The

reflection shows little

connections to class material or

real-world events.


his/her budget is not really

thoughtful or relevant. The

reflection shows no

connections to class material

or real-world events.

creating a personal budget assignment

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