Zambia Grade 8 Business Studies Syllabus

1. An Office

• Functions of an Office: An office facilitates computing, data analysis, storage, and planning.
• Types of Offices: Includes open offices, closed offices, and virtual offices.
• Organizational Chart: Illustrates the structure and hierarchy of an organization, outlining the functions of different departments such as Administration, Accounts/Finance, Human Resource, Marketing/Advertising/Sales, Procurement/Purchasing, Planning, Maintenance/Engineering, Transport and logistics, and Legal.
• Job Opportunities: Covers various roles within an office environment, including Managing Director, General Manager, Financial Manager, Accounts clerks, and Registry clerks.
• Office Etiquette: Emphasizes acceptable professional conduct, including appearance, reliability, punctuality, loyalty, courtesy, and responsibility.

2. Entrepreneurship

• Entrepreneur: Defines entrepreneurship and the qualities of a good entrepreneur, such as being open to criticism, hardworking, independent, organized, innovative, responsive to feedback, and a risk-taker.
• Entrepreneurial Activities: Explores various entrepreneurial activities within the community, including farming, fishing, poultry, beekeeping, dairy, selling, transport, and hair salons.
• Reasons for Entrepreneurship: Examines the motivations behind entrepreneurship, including innovation, creativity, grassroots development, social progress, national development, self-reliance, flexibility, job creation, maintaining free enterprise, promoting healthy competition, generating wealth/profit, spreading prosperity, and enhancing wealth stability.
• Types of Businesses: Introduces different business structures, such as sole traders, partnerships, and cooperatives.
• Business Idea: Discusses sources of business ideas, including personal inspiration, friends, family, books, media, and existing businesses.
• SWOT Analysis: Explains the process of analyzing Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats for a new business idea.
• Company Formation: Covers factors to consider before starting a company, such as locality, start-up capital, trading hours, source of raw materials, competitors, advertising, and banking. It also includes the necessary documents for company formation, such as Partnership Deed, Articles of partnership, Articles of Association, Memorandum of Associations, trading licenses, and business permits.
• Business Plan: Details the contents and functions of a business plan, including the executive summary, business idea, marketing plan, form of business, staffing, legal responsibilities, insurance, costing, financial planning, and required start-up capital.
• Financing Businesses: Explores various financing options, including savings, bank loans, borrowing from friends or family, leasing, and subletting.
• Desirable Business Ethics: Emphasizes ethical principles such as honesty, integrity, fairness, loyalty, dependability, flexibility, punctuality, and responsibility.
• Dealing with Fraud: Identifies fraudulent situations (e.g., shopping, internet, ATM, unreliable borrowing sources), explains ways to stay protected from fraud, and describes the effects of fraud on victims and fraudsters.

3. Office Stationery and Equipment

• Stationery: Identifies different types of stationery (e.g., paper, pens, rulers, envelopes, rubbers, stencils, ink/toner, carbon papers, correction fluid, filling clips, pins) and their proper storage.
• Equipment: Identifies various office equipment (e.g., typewriters, duplicators, filing cabinets, staplers, hole punchers, telephones, intercoms, desk calendars, date stamps, facsimile machines, stylus pens, calculating machines, photocopiers, printers, computers, shredders, scanners, guillotines) and their proper use and storage.

4. Business Transactions

• Types of Business Transactions: Explains different types of transactions, including cash (cash/bank), credit, and barter.

5. Business Documents

• Types of Business Documents: Covers various business documents, including inquiries, orders, quotations, catalogs, estimates, tenders, advice notes, invoices, receipts, cash sale records, petty cash vouchers, debit/credit notes, delivery/consignment notes, goods received notes, cheques, cheque counterfoils, and cheque stubs. Students will learn to draw and fill in these documents correctly.

6. Source Documents

• Types of Source Documents: Includes invoices, receipts, cash sale records, debit/credit notes, cheques, and cheque counterfoils/stubs. Students will learn to identify, draw, and fill in these documents.

7. Books of Original Entry

• Types of Books of Original Entry: Covers Purchases Day Book, Sales Day Book, Journal Proper/General Journal, Returns Inwards/Sales Returns, Returns Outwards/Purchases Returns, Cash Book (one, two, and three-column), and Petty Cash Book (imprest system). Students will learn to record business transactions from source documents into these books.

8. Classes of Accounts

• Types of Classes of Accounts: Identifies and explains different classes of accounts, including Nominal/Fictitious Accounts, Real/Assets Accounts, and Personal Accounts.

9. Ledger

• Double Entry System: Introduces the concept of double-entry bookkeeping and the principle of "debit the receiver and credit the giver." Students will learn to post transactions using this principle.
• Types of Ledgers: Covers different types of ledgers, such as General Ledger, Purchases Ledger, and Sales Ledger.

10. Trial Balance

• Use of the Trial Balance: Explains the purpose and preparation of a trial balance, including checking for arithmetical errors, ensuring the completion of double-entry, and balancing the accounts.