career exploration assignment middle school

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20 Career Activities for Middle School Students

June 23, 2023 //  by  Shelley Uselman

If the question “what do you want to be when you grow up” leads to blank stares, then you’re in the right place! Middle school students are just beginning to recognize that they have a place in the world. Help them explore their potential through fun career activities!

These 20 middle school activities will help your students develop their own identities as they explore career choices. Many of the jobs they will have in the future are in fields that don’t yet exist; make sure to focus on building essential skills alongside career research.

1. 5 Reasons That Career Exploration Must Begin in Middle School 

This article has some excellent background on the challenges that high school graduates are facing when they leave school without a plan. For students who do have a plan, they began to formulate that plan during middle school. Take some time to read through the reasons why middle school career education is a must.

Learn More: Apprentice Learning

2. Middle School CTE Podcasts and Webinars

Check out this collection of podcasts and webinars that focus specifically on exploring Career and Technical Education (CTE) programs for middle school.

Learn More: Association for Carreer and Technical Education

3. Host a Career Day

Community members love to be part of local schools! Hosting a Career Day is a great way to build connections between your school and your community. Don’t forget to invite a well-known community figure to start it off!

Learn More: Sign Up Genius

4. Self-Reflection Activities

One of the great things about middle school students is that they start to see themselves as individuals. Before diving into career exploration activities, it is helpful to first get them thinking about their strengths and likes. This will help them when thinking about their career journey.

Learn More: MN Program of Study

5. Online Self-Assessment

This career clusters interest survey would be best for older middle school students who have already done some self-reflection on their skills and interests, or it could be used as a whole-class example of how to explore career clusters.

Learn More: Education Planner

6. Complete Middle School Program Resource

If you’re building a program from scratch, this entire career unit will provide everything you need! There are 36 lessons targeting 6th and 7th grade students. That’s enough to cover most of the school year!

Learn More: Exploring

7. Collaborative Job Shadow

This twist on traditional job shadowing uses a stuffed school mascot or another object. Parents take the object to work and take pictures while it “participates” in different job-related tasks! Once the object has explored a variety of careers, put together a bulletin board or other display to create career biographies within your community!

Learn More: The Creative Counselor

8. Reality Check

Do you want to live in a house or apartment? City or suburbs? Fancy car or public transportation? Once students make their choices, they’ll get the “reality check” of how much that lifestyle will cost! This works to show how decisions about careers can influence their future.

Learn More: Texas Reality Check

9. Occupational Posters

These posters can be downloaded and printed for use as career awareness activities. They are organized as career clusters and show a connection between careers. Chances are, there is a poster for a career that students have never heard of!

Learn More: Workforce Solutions

10. Claim Your Future Game

Available as a classroom or online game, this resource has students develop awareness about career options through different scenarios. In addition to asking about future financial goals, students are given an average salary and have to make decisions about career paths.

Learn More: Claim Your Future

11. Careers Taboo

A fun do-it-yourself career game is based on the popular board game “Taboo.” Students are given a topic from their college & career vocabulary that they must describe to their team, but there are specific words that can not be used. This is a great way to get kids thinking about different career pathways while having fun!

Learn More: Ms. Sepp’s Counselor Corner

12. My First Resume

Students struggle with how to describe their skills. Some middle school students may be looking at summer jobs and need to learn how to write a resume. This resource provides an example of what should be on the resume of a younger person, and how to format it appropriately.

Learn More: Money Prodigy

13. Career Day at Pixie Academy

While targeting elementary grades, this reading activity does a fantastic job of exploring how we can individually contribute to our community through the variety of jobs we have. This activity would work for 6th grade, or older middle school students could be paired with younger students.

Learn More: Common Lit

14. Scholastic “Jobs of the Future” 

Scholastic has published dozens of career readiness activities, recognizing that the jobs of today won’t necessarily be the jobs of tomorrow. Browse through the links to resources for a wide variety of tasks geared towards recognizing current occupation trends.

Learn More: Scholastic

15. Career Personality Profiler

Best for older middle school students, this fun career exploration activity approaches career paths by examining personality traits. Great for students who enjoy taking online personality quizzes!

Learn More: Truity

16. The Uber Game

It’s important for kids to learn about non-traditional forms of employment, such as the gig economy or freelancing. In this fun career planning game, players will explore whether or not they can make enough to pay the bills by working as an Uber driver.

Learn More: The Uber Game

17. Career Village

To quote their intro, “Career Village is a community where students can get free personalized career advice from real-life professionals.” This is a great resource for students who have career aspirations that don’t line up with what is usually explored. This website allows them to connect with real professionals in a wide variety of careers.

Learn More: Career Village

18. Take Your Child to Work Day

Originally designed as “Take Our Daughters to Work Day” to introduce more girls into the workforce, this annual event has evolved into an opportunity for all kids to experience what their parents or caregivers do on a day-to-day basis at work. This website covers one professional’s experience with this day, and also includes resources for those who work from home but still want to participate!

19. Career Research Worksheet

This worksheet is a great way to introduce career research. With easily-identified topics, students can quickly figure out what skills are needed, how much it pays, and most importantly, what opportunities for growth there are in their chosen field.

Learn More: Biz World

20. Earn Your Future

This final resource is another exploration for students around career education. In “Earn Your Future,” students work their way through modules that explore the different topics related to potential careers. The modules are organized by grade level, so you’re sure to find the topics you need!

Learn More: PwC Charitable Foundation

Career Exploration for Students and Kids (19 Free Resources)

By: Author Amanda L. Grossman

Posted on Last updated: December 29, 2023

Teach students and kids about careers with these 19 free worksheets and lesson plans. Career exploration for students to do.

One of the most important reasons behind a formal education – besides teaching your students how to think for themselves – is to get kids ready to take on an engaging and exciting career.

And a career? Well, that’s the foundation to any person being able financially provide for themselves – what we call, financial independence.

That’s why I take a real interest in helping kids, tweens, and teens get the best fun career exploration activities resources out there.

So that one day, they can find a fulfilling job and be able to earn enough money to not only survive, but thrive.

Career Exploration for Students

What all is involved in career exploration for students?

To be honest, there’s a lot to cover here.

You want to provide fun and engaging activities for topics like:

• Understanding Careers : The foundational blocks of understanding how a person earns money, having a job versus working on a career, how to develop your career, etc.
• Career Interest Assessments : Which careers intersect a child’s natural abilities and a child’s interests?
• Career Investigation : What does a day look like when holding down a job in one of those career fields that interests a student? What’s the salary like? This can include activities in the classroom, research, and also shadowing.
• Skill Identification and Development : What skills do they need to pursue a job that interests them? What level of education would they need?
• Understanding How to Get Hired : Things like interviews, creating a resume, job searches, etc. are critical for students to know how to do.
• Career Stepping Stones : What steps can the student take right now (and before they graduate high school) in order to set themselves just a few steps closer to getting into that career field (i.e. internships, volunteer activities, writing a first resume (here are free teen resume templates ), type of afterschool/weekend jobs)?
• Income and Paycheck Management : Discussing how to not only manage a paycheck from a real-job, but also how to manage your career so that your income more than matches current cost of living needs. Also, going over paycheck taxes, pay type (salary, hourly, commissions), insurance, workplace retirement contributions, and other deductions.

Whew – that list wasn’t meant to overwhelm you.

Rather, I wanted to inspire you with what an important and life-changing topic you’re covering with your students and kids.

Plus, to outline some of the areas you can cover with these fun career activities and resources I’ve found for you, below.

Career Exploration for Kids – Free Career Assessments

First up, let’s talk about how to get your kids and students actually interested in career exploration activities.

There’s no better way to pique a student’s interest than to find out what THEY are most interested in learning about.

One way to do this is to start off your unit of study with free career assessments.

1. Truity.com Career Assessment

I spoke with the people at Truity.com, and they said a good age minimum to take their free career assessment is 14/15 years of age.

The test is free to take, plus you get a basic report with results. You don’t even need to have a student register for them to do this!

However, if you want to be able to view each of your student’s results, you’d have to sign up for a Pro account.

2. CareerOneStop’s Career Assessment

This free, 30-question career quiz from the U.S. Department of Labor will help a student figure out some possible career choices.

3. O*NET Interest Profiler

Another career assessment test sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor is O*NET’s interest profiler. There are 60 questions in total.

Psst: want even more career websites for students? Here's 14 career websites for high school students .

4. CommonLit Career Day at Pixie Academy

Age: 4th Grade

Here's a reading passage that's centered around some great career and job terms. The theme of the story is Pixie finding a new job.

Assessment questions and a teacher's guide are included.

Career Exploration Worksheets for Students

While I don’t recommend you center your entire career unit around career exploration worksheets, the ones below can definitely add to students discovering jobs, industries, etc.

1. Find Your “Right Now” Job

Suggested Grades: 6-8

Scholastic has some fantastic worksheets and lesson plans to help with career exploration for students.

In the “ Find Your Right Now Job ” worksheet, students will research jobs and apprenticeships around their area of interests to find two jobs that they could apply to (when they're a bit older).

2. Career Research Worksheet

Here’s a simple, one-page worksheet you can get for free with a free account on Teachers Pay Teachers.

It will help focus your student’s career research.

3. Career Family Tree

This free worksheet of fun career activities has an idea that I love – for students to create a family career tree. They’ll need to ask family members and do the research, which of course is a great way for kids to understand their loved ones even better (plus to learn a thing or two).

4. Classroom Job Application

With a free Teachers Pay Teachers account, get this simple classroom job application your students can fill out to “apply” for classroom jobs.

5. Earning Income Career Earning Worksheet

BizWorld has this free, simple worksheet to help your students research a career and salary information.

6. Collection of Career Exploration Worksheets (9-12 grades)

Here’s a bunch of different career activities and worksheets for grades 9-12 .

Worksheets include:

• Reality Check Worksheet
• Networking Bingo
• Speed Interviewing

Career Lesson Plans

Looking for more than just career preparedness worksheets?

Check out these enter career lesson plans, available for free.

Hint: many of them include both worksheets and videos.

1. National Retail Federation's Library

The National Retail Federation (NRF) has a program called RISE Up , a certifying program with curriculum that helps students and young adults get hired in the retail industry.

Check out the RISE Up classroom activities section to find lots of short videos from people actually in the retail industry, answering questions students might have and teaching students about their industry. It also includes a worksheet for each video.

2. PWC’s Earn Your Future Digital Classroom

Check out Level 3 (for Grades 9 – 12), Module Chart Your Course . It talks about:

• The relationship between education and careers
• The opportunity cost of pursuing additional education
• The importance of monetary and nonmonetary compensation when selecting a job

3. BizKid’s It’s a Job to Get a Job

Download an entire lesson plan for high schoolers that include topics like:

• Job search techniques
• Interviewing
• Adding value as an employee

4. NGPF's Career Unit

This is a full-year course, with the following units:

• Unit Plan & Assessments
• Career Basics
• Choosing a Career
• Workplace Skills
• Finding a Job
• Your LinkedIn Profile
• Resumes & Cover Letters
• Interviewing for a Job
• Outcomes of a Job Interview
• Starting a New Job
• Career Sucesss

5. Louisiana Department of Education's Virtual Workplace Experience

The state of Louisiana has come up with these free resources to help students explore careers in LA's highest-demand industries. These are project-based learning activities.

Honestly, there's a ton here.

They've broken it down into the following units:

• General Resources
• Portfolio Projects Resources
• Getting Started
• Healthcare and Pharmacy
• Automotive Service & Repair
• Construction Crafts/Skilled Trades
• Information Technology
• Advanced Manufacturing
• Transportation and Logistics
• Business Management and Finance
• Sales and Customer Service

Career Games for Kids

These career games for kids and teens create an engaging way to teach career awareness.

1. Career Charades

Age: 7-9 years

Students are asked to brainstorm lots of different careers (it's suggested that they can ask parents, grandparents, and others to come up with ideas ahead of time).

Each student writes these ideas onto a piece of paper, and everyone takes turns acting out a career while others try to guess what they're doing.

Great for better awareness about career options!

2. Claim Your Future

Students select different career paths, are given a typical salary, and then are given various spending choices. The amount of money they spend throughout the game is tracked so that they can see, and make any adjustments as needed.

3. The Payoff

Suggested Age Range: 14 years and older

Practical Money Skills has come up with another free online career game, and this time it's all about two teenagers trying to start up a business in a competitive atmosphere.

Students will have to evaluate business deals, learn how to grow their business, and how to overcome financial challenges in business and in life.

4. Auction Adventures – Auctioneer Career Game for Kids

Suggested Age Range: Grades 3-5

Being paid by commission is wayyyyy different than getting a salary (or, even, being paid hourly). You have to actually sell something to make any money!

This game has your students calculate their commission rates while, at the same time, learning about how auctioneers work in a variety of different places.

Here's a set of worksheets to go along with this game.

5. The Uber Game

Like it or not, the “gig economy” where people are not full employees of companies, but still accept gigs from them and earn a small or substantial amount of money on the side, seems to be here to stay.

So, kids should understand how this can fit into their career and money plans!

The Uber Game gives your teen a scenario, such as they have a $1,000 mortgage payment due in a week, and then asks them to try and earn enough money through accepting gigs in order to pay that bill.

Can they do it? Is it hard or easy? Can they sustain themselves on a gig job?

Psst: You’ll want to check out my 31 free personal finance homeschool curriculum , as some of the resources also have free career resources.

Career Research for Students

When students research a career, they need to look at it from several different angles before deciding if it’s possibly on their “Career Hitlist”.

Here are the different things to research for a career:

• Find Income information : Salary, or hourly pay? What’s the range? Do people have this as their only job, or do they need to supplement with a second job to “make ends meet” (i.e. pay all their bills plus save money each month)?
• Ask People and Watch Interviews : Your student will want to make sure a day in the life of a potential profession is something they’d actually be interested in. Interviewing current employees in a profession, or even watching videos where professionals are interviewed can be really helpful.
• Find Shadow Opportunities : Students can go shadow a job within your school district, or with a family/friend. Or, they can take part in a Take Your Child to Work day at their parent’s/aunt’s employer. 

Psst: Have you ever heard of CareerVillage ? Students can ask career-related questions and get them answered by professionals, for free! Students of all ages are accepted, and they’ll need to create an account (for free) to ask a question.

1. How to Research a “Day in the Life”

You want your students to feel what it’s like to be on the job in a career path they’re researching.

Help them to do this by:

• Career Biographies : There are a vast number of what I like to call career biographies that help a child understand what it’s actually like to pursue a certain career field. I’ve got an article on 22 career books for kids , broken down by age and profession type.
• Career Videos : These can be really helpful, particularly when funds don’t allow for school field trips. MyAmericanFarm.org has a great collection of 3 to 26-minute videos on all different types of agricultural careers . PathSource has an impressive collection of career interview videos. Kids Work! Has a nice collection of ca r eer videos for kids (Grades 3-8). You can also search YouTube for “Day in the Life of _______”.
• Career Shadowing : Career shadowing was quite cool when I was in high school. Students should be encouraged to shadow someone at their job, whether it’s a parent/family member, or even someone within the school district. Reach out to your principal, vice principal, administrative assistants, and anyone else working at your school district to see if you can set up some job shadowing to go along with your career unit.
• Career Interviewing : You could have your students brainstorm a list of interview questions for someone in a job they’re curious about, and then actually help them find a person to interview either by email or in person. Imagine what they could learn from the experience!
• Take Your Child to Work Day : My sister and I both took turns taking the train to Washington D.C. to my aunt’s, and then she would take us into her job at NBC for a “Take Your Child to Work Day”. It was SO neat! It’s really a perfect way to get a taste for what a day in a job looks like (not to mention, motivate a child to want to do better at school so they can get some of the cool positions they get to see). Here's how you can do take your child to work day activities .
• Career Videos : These can be really helpful, particularly when funds don’t allow for school field trips. MyAmericanFarm.org has a great collection of 3 to 26-minute videos on all different types of agricultural careers . PathSource has an impressive collection of career interview videos. Kids Work! Has a nice collection of ca r eer videos for kids (Grades 3-8).
• Career Articles : CommonLit has some Day in the Life career articles, such as A Day in the Life of an Astronaut . Also, ReadWorks has some of these articles.

2. How to Research Income Information

While it used to be difficult to figure out income averages for a career or job type, it’s quite simple nowadays thanks to some seriously great, free, resources provided by the Department of Labor.

Here’s a one-stop salary finder , where you enter the occupation and your location to get an idea of the average pay.

It also offers a listing of professions, so students can click around by career cluster (or category) and just explore.

Psst: another important thing to make students aware of through research? Are career projections. In other words, is an industry or job path they want to pursue growing, or are the jobs getting scarcer? Here’s a great resource from Workforce Solutions (for just the Houston-Galveston area, though it still drives the point home about the importance of this question) that shares percentages for various careers.

3. Lessons to Understand Paycheck Taxes and Deductions

EverFI has free financial literacy lessons for kids and students, and Lesson 3 is on income and taxes .

Students will be given different ideas about careers, as well as the pros and cons to each.

Career Projects for Middle School Students

Looking for a career project your middle school students will enjoy?

1. Middle School Exploratory Tasks

Kentucky's Department of Education has a really cool resource – a group of middle school career projects, broken down by 16 different career clusters (and 80 different career pathways within those clusters).

Not only that, but they have student work samples for each one!

There are projects and exploratory tasks for careers in:

• Agriculture
• Human Services
• … and ten others
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30+ Awesome Career-Readiness Activities That Teach Soft Skills

Students need these skills to succeed in the workplace.

Our vision is to unlock the potential of each learner at every stage of life. At McGraw Hill, we believe that your diverse experiences enrich the way you learn, teach, and grow. See how Career Explorations  introduces students to hundreds of diverse careers and critical soft skills needed to set them on a purposeful path through high school and beyond.

When it’s time for students to start working and/or head to college, they’ll need “soft skills,” otherwise known as career-readiness or job-readiness skills, in addition to academic knowledge and vocational skills.

Soft skills are those characteristics that help you function as an individual (motivation, self-confidence, flexibility) as well as within a group (teamwork, negotiation, respect). These job-readiness skills are key for succeeding in the workplace. After all, if you can’t show up on time, speak up for yourself, or get along with your peers, chances are you’re not going to have a very smooth go of it.

Explicitly teaching students these job-readiness skills is the best way to give them valuable insight into their strengths and weaknesses. We’ve rounded up just over 30 engaging lessons and activities that are not only just right for teaching the job-readiness skills students need, they are also a lot of fun!

1. Use an engaging curriculum for career exploration and readiness

There are so many important things to teach our students before they’re ready to leave high school that it’s daunting to know where to begin. That’s why having strong, trusted resources can make such a difference. McGraw Hill’s Career Explorations program for middle and early high school is an excellent example of such a curriculum. The resources blend occupation and industry content with case studies and real-world, application-based questions and activities to grab students’ attention right from the start. And real-world, industry-specific soft-skills practice questions throughout each chapter expose students to types of challenges they’ll face regardless of what career path they pursue.

Skills they’ll practice:

Collaboration, critical thinking, problem-solving

Explore the program: McGraw Hill Career Explorations

2. Listen and recap

There are so many things competing for kids’ attention in today’s overstimulating world, so learning the simple art of listening can be a difficult task. This one-on-one communication activity will help students practice taking the time to clear their minds, focus, and really listen to what their partner is saying in a way that they can clearly and accurately repeat.

Divide students into pairs. Partner one draws a topic card from a prepared deck and talks about that topic, while partner two listens without speaking. The listener must really focus on simply receiving their partner’s words—not letting their mind wander or think about how they are going to respond. Then, without a rebuttal, partner two recaps what partner one said. Then, they switch roles.

Listening, respect, interpersonal skills, communication

Buy it: Letz Talk Conversation Cards at Amazon

3. Make a game of it

Responsibility isn’t something students develop overnight. It takes lots of practice to show self-control when things don’t go our way, to be accountable for our decisions, to finish what we start, and to keep trying even when we want to give up. Try these five super-fun games (below) that teach responsibility.

Responsibility, flexibility, patience

Learn more: 5 Great Games for Teaching Your Students About Responsibility

4. Serve others

Service-learning projects not only get kids involved in their communities, they help them develop many valuable job-readiness skills that will be assets on the job one day. Team students up to organize a book or food drive, recruit bilingual students to provide translation services, or encourage budding artists to collaborate on a community art event.

Teamwork, respect, time management, responsibility

Learn more: 30 Meaningful Service Learning Projects for Kids and Teens

5. Cultivate critical thinking

Critical thinking is the ability to examine a subject and develop an informed opinion about it. It’s about asking questions, then looking closely at the answers to form conclusions that are backed by provable facts, not just “gut feelings” and opinion. And it’s definitely on the top of most employers’ wish lists for new employees. Click the link below for fun and engaging classroom activities that’ll get your students’ gears turning.

Critical thinking, problem-solving, flexibility, self-confidence

Learn more: 5 Critical Thinking Skills Every Kid Needs To Learn and How To Teach Them

6. Human Marble Run

Working together to meet a goal takes patience and focus. This IRL version of Marble Run will help your students learn job-readiness skills like working together, and they’ll have fun doing it!

Give each member of the team a length of gutter or drainpipe. The team has to transfer a tennis ball or golf ball from one place to another by rolling the ball from one piece of gutter to the next. Make it interesting by making the team get the ball to traverse an obstacle course or to go up and down stairs.

Patience, negotiation, teamwork, communication

7. No-hands cup-stacking challenge

This hands-on group challenge is an exercise in learning job-readiness skills like patience and perseverance, not to mention it’s a total blast!

Decide how many students you want in each group, and tie that number of strings to a single rubber band. Each person in the group holds on to one of the strings attached to the rubber band. As a group, they use this device to pick up the cups (by pulling the rubber band apart and then bringing it back together over the cups) and place them on top of one another in order to build a pyramid.

Critical thinking, problem-solving, teamwork, patience

Learn more: Cup Stack from Ms. Sepp’s Counselor Corner

8. Paper bag skits

You never know what life is going to hand to you. This is true at work, school, and in life in general. Sometimes you’re handed a set of circumstances and have very little time to figure out what to do. This fun activity will help teens practice thinking on their feet.

Fill a few paper bags with four or five assorted classroom or household items. Break the teens into groups, and assign each group a bag without showing them what’s inside. Give them two minutes to examine the items in their bag and come up with a skit, using all of the items, for the rest of the class.

Time management, teamwork, flexibility, presentation skills

9. Nurture self-knowledge

Journaling is a powerful tool for creative expression and reflection, but did you know that it can also be an effective way to improve mental health? Recording your thoughts and feelings can be a cathartic form of stress relief, an opportunity to get to know yourself better, and a way to help you feel more grounded and authentic in your beliefs. Try these free writing prompt cards with your middle and high schoolers to help them get started.

Stress management, self-confidence, motivation

Learn more: Deep Writing Journal Prompts for Teens from Journal Buddies

10. Foster self-motivation

Self-motivation is one of the key indicators of success in the future. Conversely, lack of motivation leads to big problems not only in school but on the job later on. But how do we teach something that comes from inside? Check out the activities below for some great tips like breaking big dreams into smaller pieces, envisioning a bright future, encouraging students to share their stories, and more.

Work ethic, critical thinking, self-confidence

Learn more: How To Instill Intrinsic Motivation from 7Mindsets

11. Hold a poetry slam

Slam poetry is a unique performance art that will not only give your students the opportunity to express their thoughts, but build their confidence as well. Slam poems are specifically written to be performed in front of an audience, and topics are often diverse, political, and thought-provoking. Finding your voice and being able to move people with your words are job-readiness skills that can apply to any future endeavor.

Self-confidence, presentation skills, teamwork

Learn more: What Is Slam Poetry and How Can Teachers Use It With Students?

12. Team survival challenge

What would happen if your class went out on a pleasure cruise only to end up being lost at sea? Who would take charge? What materials would be essential for survival? If you ever saw an episode of the TV series Lost , you know that making these decisions as a group can get ugly fast. This activity is a great lesson in group decision-making, as students will undoubtedly have different ideas about what materials to add to a limited list in a limited amount of time.

Critical thinking, negotiation, communication, teamwork

Learn more: Lost at Sea from Grahame Knox

13. Start a school garden

A school garden is an amazing, hands-on way to help teach students about responsibility. From planning what to grow and organizing the supplies needed to creating a maintenance schedule and actually getting down and dirty in the garden, it’s a project that requires hard work and perseverance.

Responsibility, teamwork, problem-solving, patience

Learn more: How One School Garden Transformed a Neighborhood

14. Time-management challenge

We all have days when our list of tasks is huge, and the amount of time we have to complete them just isn’t. When time is tight and your agenda is packed, you’ve got to prioritize tasks and work efficiently! This activity gives students the opportunity to practice just that by presenting them with a long list of tasks to complete in a limited time frame.

Make a list of tasks on chart paper, assigning a point value for each job. For example: Do 25 jumping jacks (5 points); make up a nickname for each member of the group (5 points); get every person in the class to sign a piece of paper (15 points); form a conga line and conga from one end of the room to the other (5 points; 10 bonus points if anyone joins you); etc. Make sure you list enough tasks to take up more than 10 minutes.

Divide your students into groups of five or six and give them 10 minutes to collect as many points as they can by deciding which tasks to perform. A debriefing session is essential with this game. Guide your students to think about how they made decisions, which group dynamics came into play, and how they determined the value of each task.

Negotiation, critical thinking, communication, time management

15. Vision boards

Unleash your students’ creativity while simultaneously helping them set goals for the future with a vision board. We don’t frequently take the time to express who we are and what we hope for. Setting aside time to contemplate can motivate teens to think deeply about what they really want in life and also fuel their desire to do what’s necessary in order to reach their dreams.

Self-confidence, motivation, critical thinking

Learn more: Why Teachers Should Create Vision Boards With Their Students from Study All Knight

16. Collaborative contract

This exercise for middle schoolers helps them establish values-based ground rules for a team. Each student takes an index card and lists three values that they believe will promote a sense of community. Team members discuss the values, consolidating them into more precise categories. They write the finalized list on a poster board, with each student signing it. Whenever there is a dispute, the team should refer to the “contract,” which holds everyone accountable.

The purpose of this exercise is to create a safe space to explore ideas by focusing on common language and shared expectations. Additionally, this activity prepares middle-school students for the workplace by emphasizing similarities rather than differences.

Negotiation, communication, listening, respect

17. Zombie apocalypse

In this two-day lesson, students are required to identify soft skills, literary guides, and everyday objects that will help them survive a zombie apocalypse. They’ll work both cooperatively and independently and produce short pieces of persuasive writing to argue in favor of their survival.

Teamwork, interpersonal skills (collaboration), problem-solving

Learn more: Zombie Invasion Plan  from Sarah Andrasik

18. Stoke their competitive fire

According to teacher Christine Weis , there’s nothing like a little healthy competition in the classroom. “It motivates students and drives them to put forth their best effort,” she says. “It sparks interest, passion, and ignites a fire within.” Not only can healthy competition build confidence, it can encourage students to learn something new and develop new skills. Try games, puzzles, sports, quiz competitions, team presentations, etc., to motivate your students to reach a higher level.

Motivation, work ethic, problem-solving, self-confidence

Learn more: 7 Motivational Activities for Students from The Homeschool Resource Room

19. The blindfold game

Teens leading one another around in blindfolds? Are we sure this is a good idea? The answer is yes when it’s part of a structured, purposeful job-readiness skills activity like this one!

You’ll need a large space for this activity (maybe the cafeteria after lunch or the gym during an off-period), enough blindfolds for half of the participants, and furniture and other items that you can use as obstacles (cardboard boxes, pillows, chairs, tables). Scatter furniture and objects around the room before the activity begins. Your course should be challenging but safe to navigate.

Pair students and have them line up at one end of the room. One person from each pair should put on the blindfold. The sighted person must guide their partner across the room and give them clear oral instructions (without touching them) to help them avoid the obstacles. When each team reaches the far side of the room, partners can switch roles and repeat the exercise. Have just a few pairs tackle the course at a time so that the others can observe. Take some time between rounds to process what went well, what didn’t, and what could make the challenge easier.

Communication, listening, respect (taking the task and their partner’s safety seriously), flexibility

20. Take a mini crash course

Our teens may almost look like adults, but we have to remember they still have a lot to learn. And sometimes the best way to teach them what they need to know is to just spell it out. This video is a no-nonsense tutorial about some of the job-readiness skills that employers find valuable. Hold a screening, then after the video, have students form breakout groups to talk about what portion of the video they found most helpful and what they need to work on.

Communication, listening, critical thinking

21. Human knot

Nothing promotes job-readiness skills such as cooperation like getting all tangled up with your classmates — literally!

Players stand in a circle and reach out to shake hands with other players, with each hand holding that of a different person, creating a “human knot.” Then the players have to figure out how to untangle their bodies without letting go of each other’s hands. This activity lends itself to a vibrant debriefing session as students observe their communication and cooperation skills.

Teamwork, communication, problem-solving

Learn more: The Human Knot Game from Icebreaker Ideas

22. Mind your mental health

Managing stress in school (and on the job) is a timely subject. With mental health issues on the rise across the country, it’s critical to teach your students strategies that will help them stay grounded and build resilience. After all, it’s hard to do your best in any endeavor when you’re stressed to the max. Try the empowering activities below to teach students how to manage stress so they can succeed in college, on the job, and in the future.

Self-confidence, problem-solving, leadership

Learn more: 22 Empowering Mental Health Activities for Teens

23. Rope Circle Shimmy

Divide teens into two groups. Each group should have a minimum of five members. To begin play, make a big circle out of rope for each team and put it on the floor. Each member of the team stands at the edges of the circle, so the rope is taut around their ankles, while holding their hands in the air.

Team members must take turns moving to work the rope up from ankles to wrists, keeping hands in the air at all times. The team member will have to wiggle and move to slide the rope up. Other team members can help by keeping the rope as taut as possible. The team that finishes the challenge first wins!

Communication, flexibility, interpersonal skills (cooperation)

Learn more: Looped to Rope from Mom Junction

24. Four-card negotiation

Sometimes to get ahead in life, you have to know how to wheel and deal. This is entirely what this lesson is all about. The objective is for teams to trade and barter for pieces of cards to match up with the pieces they already have and ultimately end up with four complete playing cards.

Start with a pile of playing cards (four cards per team of four or five students). Cut each card diagonally into four pieces and mix all of the pieces together. Now divide the mixed-up pieces evenly among the teams. Give teams a couple of minutes to sort out their card pieces and figure out which pieces they have and which pieces are missing. Set a timer for 10 minutes. The goal of the game is for the students to use their negotiation skills with the other teams in order to gain as many complete cards as possible for their team. At the end of 10 minutes, the team with the most cards wins.

Negotiation, communication, interpersonal skills

25. Pair up with younger kids

Nothing helps teens build responsibility like pairing up with a younger buddy. Being the more mature, more experienced partner in the relationship gives teens the opportunity to share what they know and learn to be a leader. Have your students plan fun activities and special events with their buddies.

Responsibility, leadership, problem-solving, listening, patience

Learn more: 20 Activities for Big Buddy/Little Buddy Time from Create, Dream, Explore

26. Blind spelling practice

Weaving soft-skills activities into everyday curriculum is a win for everyone. Enhance your students’ interpersonal skills with this fun spelling activity. Tape letters to each student’s back. Then call out a definition of a word. Students will need to work together to assemble in the right order to spell the word correctly.

Communication, listening, negotiation, problem-solving

Learn more:  Manuel Antonio Noronha

27. Practice small talk

Teenagers aren’t exactly known for their chitchat skills. In fact, for many it is one of the most awkward situations they can imagine being put in. But small talk is considered a foundational job-readiness skill that is important for almost every job, as well as learning to network. Many teens feel awkward speaking with people they’re not used to speaking to and need practice, especially with adults. Try some free conversation starters that will help them practice the “three P’s” of small talk: being polite, positive, and professional.

Communication, listening, self-confidence, patience, respect

Learn more: Conversation Starters on the Job from Realityworks

28. Blind drawing

Try this hilarious activity with your teens. It’s kind of like “telephone” but instead of listening, each person must pay close attention to what is being drawn on their back. Each student in the line gets a blank sheet of paper taped to their back and a marker. The student at the end begins by slowly drawing an image on the person’s paper in front of them. When that person feels what’s being drawn, they try to re-create what they’re feeling on the person of front of them. When the image is complete, have the students take off their papers and compare the results. This activity is a colorful reminder that people often perceive things very differently, so communication is extremely important!

Communication, teamwork, patience

29. Mock interviews

The prospect of going on a job interview can be terrifying to a kid who’s never had a job before. Practicing job-readiness skills like interviewing can help them reduce the fear factor and build their confidence. Pair students up and assign one teen the role of interviewer and one the role of interviewee. Use a set of job interview questions to practice with.

Give each pair 15 minutes, then have them talk about how the interview went. The interviewer may have some valuable insight for the interviewee. Then have the partners switch roles and repeat. After they’ve had practice with their peers, invite a few adults into the room to conduct mock interviews.

Interview skills, critical thinking, self-confidence

Learn more: Job Interview Questions for Teens from Understood for All

30. Group storytelling

Create small groups of three to eight students. The first person makes up the first line of a story and says it out loud. The second person says, “Yes, and …,” continuing the story. Play continues around the group until everyone has contributed or until the story has come to a satisfactory ending. Since students don’t know what’s coming, they have to learn how to listen carefully and react and communicate well on the fly. As an alternative, to have students listen even more carefully, have them continue the story with the phrase, “because …”

Communication, listening, critical thinking, presentation

31. Team pen

Sometimes it takes the whole team to produce results. This fun game involves a marker with four to six strings tied to it and a blank piece of paper. The teacher calls out a word and the team has to work together to legibly print the word on the paper. Students will have to think carefully and cooperate with one another to maneuver the pen correctly to write the word.

Communication, teamwork, patience, critical thinking

Be sure to visit McGraw Hill’s Career Explorations page for more information about their career and technical education resources for middle and high school.

Also, check out these “would you rather” questions to get teens thinking about their future careers..

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Career Exploration in the Middle Grades: Playbooks for Educators and Students

Middle grades educators have the exciting opportunity to interact with students at a pivotal time in their development. The middle grades are “the finding place” that invites young adolescents to be adventurous explorers. Career exploration is a cornerstone of this process and is associated with both positive educational and employment outcomes, keeps students engaged in school, and helps them develop a better sense of self.

That’s why ASA and AMLE have teamed up to create two playbooks that equip educators and young adolescents with roadmaps for effective career exploration. In the educator guide, you will find helpful resources like implementation guides, case studies, and program sustainability resource to help you map your journey from beginning initiatives to school-wide practice. In the student playbook, you’ll find a variety of activities and materials for use directly with kids to help them learn about themselves and think about their futures.

Templates and Resources

Teacher Action Guide

Are you a teacher ready to kickstart career exploration at your school? This guide provides a helpful checklist and guiding questions/tips to aid in your planning process.

Download Now

Counselor Action Guide

Are you a counselor ready to kickstart career exploration at your school? This guide provides a helpful checklist and guiding questions/tips to aid in your planning process.

School and District Leader Action Guide

Are you a school or district leader ready to kickstart career exploration at your school? This guide provides a helpful checklist and guiding questions/tips to aid in your planning process.

Sustainability Action Guide

All members of the team should plan with an eye toward sustainability. This guide provides a helpful checklist and guiding questions/tips to keep you on the right track.

Programming Year at a Glance

Mapping programming across the school year can help you visualize your program and support accountability. Completing this calendar template will help you keep tabs on your program goals and keep program objectives top of mind.

Download Template

Download Example

3 Year Program Goals

Programs are only as effective as they are sustainable. Using this worksheet to create three-year goals will help you prioritize outcomes and determine appropriate strategies and activities for programming.

Programming Outcomes Worksheet

Measuring and evaluating your program is key to sustained success. This worksheet offers a helpful step-by-step guide to establishing an actionable measurement approach.

Observations Form

You will want to draw from a variety of data sources to measure what is working well and what might need more attention. This observation form can help you collect data from a variety of perspectives to help inform program effectiveness.

Budget Expenses Form

Depending on the type of program you create, funding needs can vary significantly. This helpful budgeting form will help you visualize the total funds you will need to successfully execute your program.

Funding for Programs

Funding can be an important factor in helping to sustain or expand current programming to create new ones. This guide provides tips for standing out in a grant application and a list of possible sources of funding.

Components of a Grant Proposal

Many schools combine public funding with additional grant funds to support programming. This document was created to aid educators across roles in writing successful proposals.

Professional Development Planning

Professional development is crucial to program sustainability. This template will help you design professional development activities to support program implementation.

Case Studies

Every Day Should be Career Day

The bell sounded, signaling the start of another class period. I hear the girls behind me talking, purchasing an Air Heads candy from a classmate who secretly sold them. My favorite was the white Air Heads, and I was a loyal customer; savoring its sweet flavor was my only saving grace during math class. The

Read More… from Every Day Should be Career Day

Navigating a Critical New Frontier in K-12 Career Readiness: Middle School Work-based Learning

When you think of “work-based learning” — that is, hands-on career education experiences like internships, apprenticeships, and job shadowing — what age group comes to mind? Odds are, you’re thinking about college or perhaps even high school. But as research conducted by American Student Assistance shows, middle school is the prime time to begin engaging

Read More… from Navigating a Critical New Frontier in K-12 Career Readiness: Middle School Work-based Learning

Team Passion Project – The Importance of Offering Student Choice in the Middle Grades

Save the bees. That was the aim of Team Passion Project, the winners of the second annual Solve Together Challenge, a national competition designed to encourage career exploration and skill-building for middle school students. The team, comprised of seventh grader from Franklin Avenue Middle School, could either select from a list of real-world problems or

Read More… from Team Passion Project – The Importance of Offering Student Choice in the Middle Grades

ASA’s Middle School Exploration Program

Free digital ten-lesson curriculum in which students can discover their skills and interests, learn about career clusters, and explore different educational options. Students will leave this program with a better understanding of how to approach decisions regarding their future plans, their skill development, and their career preferences.

Exploring Self

Unit 1 (Lessons 1-4):  Through a range of individual and group-based activities, students will explore their own skills, interests, values, and learning styles in relation to others’. By the end of the unit, each student will be able to confidently summarize their own strengths, passions, and attributes.

Understanding Options: Career Exploration

Unit 2 (Lessons 5-7):  Now that students understand themselves, they will begin to envision their futures and learn about careers that align with their goals. Games, sorting activities, and presentations fuel the exploration process, helping students gain a clearer picture of the man professional possibilities available to them.

Informing Future Decisions: Education Pathways

Unit 3 (Lessons 8-10):  Does every career require a college degree? Students will look at all the post-secondary options available –including college—and discover how to prepare for next steps after high school. Every student will leave understanding their strengths, programs that fit their goals, and growth areas to pursue.

Research in Support of Career Exploration in the Middle Grades

ACTE & Career Cruising, 2018.  Career Exploration in Middle School: Setting Students on the Path to Success.

An evidence-based overview of why career exploration is important in the middle grades as well as some of the strategies that can be used with this age group.  Includes enumerated recommendations for practitioners.

ACTE & Xello, 2020.  Starting Early: Career Development in the Early Grades.

A brief report outlining the value and benefits associated with career exploration & career development in the elementary and middle grades.  Includes case studies and recommendations for getting started.

Grant, Springer, Tuttle, & Reno, 2021.  Small-Group Counseling Intervention to Support Career Exploration of Rural Middle School Students.

A paper proposing a small-group counseling-based intervention to assist students from rural areas in their career exploration and identity development.

Ginevra & Nota, 2017.  ‘Journey in the World of Professions and Work’: A Career Intervention for Children.

An article describing a 10-unit course intended to boost students’ career adaptability.  Compared to non-participants, participating students (10-11 years old) demonstrated significantly more hope, optimism, curiosity, exploration, occupational knowledge, information, planning, and time perspective.

Godbey & Gordon, 2019. Career Exploration at the Middle School Level: Barriers and Opportunities.

An essay describing the importance of career exploration at the middle level, the opportunities for policy and practice, and the barriers to advisement and engagement.  Includes recommendations for school leaders and practitioners.

Mupinga & Caniglia, 2019. What Middle School Students Know About Careers and the Influences Surrounding Their Choices.

An article outlining ways to support middle school students’ career knowledge and their ability to make informed decisions about their future.  Includes resources for teachers in the middle grades.

Glessner, Rockinson-Szapkiw, & Lopez, 2017. “Yes, I Can”: Testing an Intervention to Increase Middle School Students’ College and Career Self-Efficacy.

An article examining the impact of a hybrid (virtual & in-person) intervention in Florida on students’ career and college self-efficacy.  Results suggest that participating students exhibited higher self-efficacy beliefs.

Grigal, Cooney, & Hart, 2019. Promoting College and Career Readiness With Middle School Youth With Disabilities: Lessons Learned From a Curriculum Development Project.

A study of a College & Career Readiness [CCR] program for middle schoolers, with and without disabilities.  Includes online resources arranged by topic as well as considerations for universal design, technology access, and the need for developmentally appropriate content.

Perna, 2019. Why Career Exploration Must Be a K-12 Priority and One Way to Make It Happen.

An opinion piece suggesting that career exploration must be holistically integrated into schooling throughout the curriculum and throughout the K-12 spectrum.  Includes a link to the author’s Career Tree framework.

Center for American Progress, 2020. Creating Strong Building Blocks for Every Student: How Middle Schools Can Lay the Foundation for Rigorous High School Pathways.

A long-form article outlining the challenges and inequities associated with access to CTE and high school pathways.  The authors discuss the added barriers introduced by COVID-19, the promise of Perkins V, and the opportunities for middle school programming.  Includes a nationwide policy landscape analysis and “5 Key Components” of successful middle school pathways.

Hanover Research, 2020. Best Practices in Middle School Career and Technical Education Expansion.

A report outlining best practices in implementing CTE in middle school.  Includes 3 case studies, a framework with target outcomes, equity considerations, and major challenges & barriers (esp. related to rural settings and technology access).

Advance CTE, 2019. Putting Afterschool to Work: Career Exploration in Out-of-School Settings.

An article outlining the promises of after-school career exploration programming.  Includes a case study and policy considerations.

Bureau of Labor Statistics

A webpage from the Bureau of Labor Statistics with resources for career exploration, games, Q&A, and resources for students and teachers in the K-12 arena.

Career Exploration Ideas: How to Get Students Excited About Career Planning

Choosing your life’s work doesn’t happen overnight. For many people, it takes years of trial and error that may include post-secondary education and a series of jobs that aren’t the right fit.  What if we could help the next generation avoid that painful process? Imagine a world where students graduated from high school with confidence in their strengths, a strong sense of purpose, and a clear pathway to a meaningful career that’s especially suited to them?  Educators and counselors have already begun to sow the seeds of future fulfilment in their students by embedding career exploration into their lessons for children as young as 3 rd grade. It’s a concept that can be woven into just about any subject and is highly compatible with social-emotional curriculum activities.  Let’s look at some ways you can introduce career exploration into your classroom or virtual classroom—at any grade level.

What Is Career Exploration?

Meaningful career exploration for students is two-pronged. It involves:

• Reflecting on an individual’s own interests, strengths, skills, values, and preferences. Students are encouraged to engage in self-discovery with exercises that answer questions like: 
• Which subjects do I most enjoy and excel in? 
• What kind of things do I like to do outside of school?
• What kind of activities do I do that make time feel like it’s flying by? (This is a good indication of flow , an important component of happiness and satisfaction.)
• Attributes of careers, i.e. core tasks involved, average salary, working conditions, etc.
• What kind of qualifications one might need to achieve each job, i.e. post-secondary study, experience, etc.
• How some careers connect to others, i.e. an engineer could also get a job as a project manager, salesperson, technician, etc.

Why Is Career Exploration Important for Students?

Every good explorer starts a journey with a map. Conditions may cause them to alter their plans and they may learn new information that leads them to change directions, but having a guiding force is a helpful way to create and retain a strong sense of purpose throughout every adventure. When we make career exploration part of the framework for every student’s education, they learn to think beyond the day’s math test or history lesson—and connect the dots between what they are learning and how they might apply it in the future. This often leads to improved engagement, higher achievement levels, reduced absenteeism, and increased graduation rates. When students have a good understanding of the working world, they can imagine how they might fit into it someday. They can prepare for the kind of career they want by setting goals, choosing courses, and focusing on extracurricular activities that support their future. Best of all, students who participate in career exploration activities often develop a stronger sense of self-esteem and self-knowledge. They naturally begin to build social-emotional learning skills such as organization, communication, problem-solving, and even financial literacy because they’re focused on achieving a goal. 

What Are Some Career Exploration Tools?

[xo-module id=”13083″] Gone are the days when educators and counselors have to rely on outdated worksheets that have been circulating since the 1980s. Today’s career exploration tools include sophisticated EdTech programs and creative ideas to engage learners of all ages.

• Xello : College and career readiness software that helps students build self-knowledge, personalized future readiness plans and critical life skills.
• WeTeachNYC : An online education community with a free unit on career exploration
• Bizworld.org : Career Exploration Lesson Plan for Grades 3-5 and 6-8.
• Teachers Pay Teachers: Career exploration trivia game and career exploration activities . 
• Boys & Girls Clubs of Canada: Learning and career development programs  

Career Exploration Activities for Elementary Students

The Forest Hills School District in Cincinnati has students as young as third grade participating in career exploration using college and career readiness software Xello. They start by playing ‘Career Town’, a game that underlines the variety of work and workers in a community, and the importance of every worker in a community.  School Counselor Kate McKenzie also has students in Grades 3-5 log their interests and achievements in Xello. “I want to get them thinking about, ‘What am I good at?’, ‘What do I like to do?’ It lends itself beautifully to goal setting and expanding their hobbies. They can start expanding their experiences which will help them craft a better story of themselves as they grow up,” she said. Other tried-and-true career exploration activities for primary students include:

• Bringing in parents and community members to share what it’s like to do their jobs. Take special care to ensure diversity and an equitable gender spread so every student can see themselves in at least one career.
• Asking students to reflect on what they enjoy and what they’re good at and then connecting that to a career. Many educators assign a ‘poster project’ in which students create colorful posters to depict the career.
• On field trips, taking special note of the careers at the museum, zoo, art gallery, or theater presentation. Ask hosts to share a little about their job as part of their presentations.

Career Exploration Activities for Middle School Students

Grades 6-8 are often considered the prime beneficiaries for career exploration activities. They are at an age when they are especially receptive to “cool” jobs and they understand the connection between careers, salaries, and the kind of lifestyle they want.  This is also a time when they will need to choose their high school courses, some of which are specialized pathways to a particular area of post-secondary study. This is where self-knowledge is especially important so they can make informed decisions that will affect their future. Career exploration activities for this group include:

• What a typical day is like
• Salary range
• Education requirements
• How/why they chose that career
• I want to work inside / outside all day.
• I want to work by myself / I want to work with other people as much as possible. 
• I want to use technology / work with my hands and/or people. 

Then have them pick three careers based on what they’ve chosen. Tools like Xello will help them narrow it down.

• Once they have highlighted three possible careers, have them chart the path to get there. What type of courses should they take in high school? Are there extracurricular activities that would give them experience? What kind of post-secondary education would lead them to that career?

Career Exploration Activities for High School Students

By this point, students should have some idea of their strengths, challenges, and passions. The goal is to avoid high school seniors who have absolutely no idea what their future holds. This is a time to double down on career exploration activities in as many classes as possible.  Activities include:

• Assigning take-home assignments focused on helping students define career options that are a good fit for them.
• Asking students to consider and present non-degree post-secondary pathways, i.e. apprenticeship programs.
• Having students uncover five “hidden” jobs each, i.e. not teacher, engineer, baker or mechanic. Ask them to find roles like HR specialist, content marketing strategist, forensic science technician, or computer network architect and present them to the class. 

School districts everywhere are increasingly recognizing the importance of career exploration, particularly when programs and activities satisfy mandates like ESSA .  More importantly, educators understand that the ripple effects of students who are engaged, have self-knowledge, and understand how they might one day fit into their communities are much more likely to choose the right post-secondary pathway for them.  A generation of purposeful adults who set and achieve the right career goals for them? When career exploration is integrated into education, it’s not only possible; it’s probable.

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Career Exploration | Career Readiness

What Is Career Exploration & How Do You Teach It?

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February 16th, 2022 | 15 min. read

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As a career exploration curriculum developer , we hear from thousands of teachers every year interested in teaching career readiness.

During those conversations, teachers ask six common questions about career exploration:

• What is career exploration?
• How does career exploration work?
• Why is career exploration helpful?
• How often should students participate in career exploration?
• How do you know when career exploration education succeeds?
• How do you teach career exploration?

In this article, we'll dive into the answers to each of these questions to help you better understand what career exploration is and how to teach it.

1. What Is Career Exploration?

In education, career exploration is the process of researching, evaluating, and learning about modern work opportunities and how students can pursue the careers of their choice.

That makes career exploration one of the most important subjects in terms of long-term life planning for students in any grade.

With that in mind, it’s time to talk about career exploration in detail, starting with how career exploration works.

2. How Does Career Exploration Work?

Different schools, education experts, and teachers all have a different way of   teaching career exploration.

For the most part, they break down the four main steps that help students learn more about the working world around them.

Before jumping right into these steps, it’s smart to start with a seed list of careers that are either common or popular in the world right now.

Careers like software developer, serial entrepreneur, social media strategist, and others are all great places to start for modern careers.

You can also use any number of more established or “traditional” careers, like accountant, psychiatrist, construction worker, clerk, and more.

Plus, you can always consider local or regional jobs that are on the rise. In many areas, that includes   healthcare careers   like certified nursing assistants, phlebotomists, or another area of expertise.

Now that you have your seed list of careers, you can dive into the steps of career exploration !

Each of these steps includes its own processes and procedures. We’ll take a look at each one in sequence so you can plan the best career exploration class possible!

To start, let’s talk about   research .

Career Exploration Step 1: Research

The research step of career exploration introduces students to specific careers that they want to understand more.

This is where students take your seed list, choose a few careers that sound interesting, and learn more about them.

You have a   ton   of different ways to do this.

The most popular way is to have students go online to school-sanctioned websites to learn more. Your school may even pay for career exploration software that’s specifically designed for students to learn more about the working world.

Another way is to lecture. This relies on your knowledge of careers and traditional classroom resources (like textbooks) .

A third way is to network with professionals in your area and have them come discuss their career with your class.

This teaching method requires clearance from your school and some degree of coordination with individuals outside your school, which can get to be a lot of work on top of your regular teaching responsibilities.

But if students seem drawn to one career in particular, you have a perfect opportunity to contact someone who actually works in that field to speak to your class.

Regardless of how you teach the research phase of career exploration, you’ll have a perfect segue into the next step —   evaluation .

Career Exploration Step 2: Evaluation

The evaluation step of career exploration empowers students to analyze the research they’ve conducted so they can get a deeper understanding of their favorite jobs.

Part of that understanding may be learning that a career simply isn’t a good fit for them at the moment.

That doesn’t mean that students will completely disregard a career, especially if they’re elementary- or middle-school aged students.

But it   does   mean that they can start looking into similar careers that may be more interesting to them.

The process tends to follow a similar pattern for any grade level in career exploration.

First, the students look at the career(s) that they chose to evaluate.

Then, they also look at the careers that support (or are supported by) their first career.

That lets students branch off from their initial career interest and learn more about a collection of careers instead of just one at a time.

This is especially useful for tech-oriented careers like a software developer. Yes, software developers are highly in-demand right now, but to succeed, they need to work with information technology professionals, business professionals, quality assurance, marketing teams, and more.

In other words, a student may   start   the evaluation process by looking at a career that they think is perfect.

By the time they’re done reading, they may have a different career aspiration, purely because they learned something new!  

The important victory here is that you’ve expanded your students’ horizons so that they can understand the breadth of possibilities in their futures.

Once students have done that, they can share their findings with the class during the   discussion   phase.

Career Exploration Step 3: Discussion

The discussion step of career exploration encourages students to talk about what they learned with their peers.

This lets students compare the careers they chose, why they liked those careers, and other offshoot careers that they discovered.

Students may also learn about new job tracks from their peers. The student from our previous example could tell their friends about IT and how interesting it is.

Likewise, two students may find out that they have a mutual career interest and hit it off talking about the requirements and possibilities of the job.

Students may   also   disagree about which careers they like. This may sound like a problem on the surface, but it can actually lead to constructive and educational conversation.

You may have to mediate the conversation a little bit, but ideally, each student discusses what they liked about one career and didn’t like about another.

This helps students understand what interests can lead to other careers while providing them with a fresh perspective on careers in general.

With that in mind, students can now get to the fourth step of almost any career exploration curriculum .

Career Exploration Step 4: Decision

The decision step of career exploration revolves around students deciding which career they’d like to pursue more.

This   does not   mean that a student is choosing the career they’ll be for their entire lives.

But — just like the first three steps of the career exploration process — it gives students a direction so they can follow their passion to a fulfilling career.

This phase is typically the fastest of the career exploration steps. You can set whatever requirements you’d like to help students move forward in their career curiosities. You could also leave it all up to them how they go after their dreams.

Regardless, these four steps are the basics of career exploration.

So why go through all of this, anyway?

After all, if your students are only with you for a semester or a quarter, can they really learn everything they need to improve their career outlooks?

The answer is yes! 

3. Why Is Career Exploration Helpful?

First and most obviously, career exploration helps students discover the jobs that are available to them after they’ve graduated from school.

In addition, they also learn what level of education, work experience, and professionalism they need to succeed in their chosen career.

For example, someone who wants to go into marketing — a career available to individuals with or without a college education — requires significantly different requirements than someone who wants to pursue the decade of post-secondary education required to be a medical doctor.

Students also learn about the income they can expect from a career, how they can obtain that income, and how they can advance throughout the tiers of their career’s expertise.

In other words, students get a head start on their post-school lives by learning about the real world.

When you have someone from that career speak to the class about their experience, you increase that value exponentially as well.

After all, career exploration classes are responsible for creating internship, externship, co-op, and apprenticeship opportunities for students.

That’s the final reason why career exploration is so helpful. With the right support and direction, students can actually start on their careers   today .

They don’t have to wait to graduate.

They don’t have to wait until they have a full resume of experience.

They can get a head start on the job market when they’re 14, if they’d like.

But 14-year-olds aren’t the only students benefiting from career exploration.

In fact, some school districts may mandate that students take career exploration classes multiple times in their academic careers

4. How Often Should Students Participate in Career Exploration?

With the ever-increasing pace of technology, the American job market can change overnight.

That’s why it’s so crucial to take a look at career exploration opportunities for students throughout their academic careers — not just in one grade!

Major cities are especially sensitive to changes in economics or job distribution since so many professionals live within their borders.

Rural areas may be more insulated, especially in towns with more self-sufficient economies. 

Either way, careers change!

They may change in terms of scope, requirements, tools, salaries, and — most importantly — availability, among other factors.

The best way to make sure students are ready for those changes is to keep them up to date! That way, they can successfully learn all of the new information that plays a role in the jobs of their dreams.

Still, this leads us to our last question about laying out your career exploration curriculum.

How can you tell when your career exploration class is successful?

5. How Do You Know When Career Exploration Succeeds?

“Success” is a tricky topic when it comes to teaching.

Everyone wants to know whether they’re successfully teaching — but how do you actually   measure   that success?

For career exploration, you have a couple different methods at your fingertips.

First, you can measure the percentage of students in your class who have concretely chosen a career they want to investigate further.

In other words, you keep track of how many students have a definite answer in the   decide portion of career exploration.

For the students who don’t have a definitive answer, you know that you have to follow up with them to get them engaged with the subject or a career that’s more suited to their interests.

Another way to measure success is with a  summative assessment  given as a traditional test or essay.

This lets your students answer questions about the class based on what they learned — not necessarily a right or wrong answer.

Instead, you get students to talk about what they learned in a class, why they liked something, why they disliked something, and what they want to do next.

The students who really get into your career exploration class will get into this assessment in no time! All they have to do is talk about what they liked and why they liked it, which is a fun and expressive activity for students of any age.

The students who aren’t quite feeling the career exploration class may have more difficulty. Again, this shows you that they didn’t quite engage with the curriculum as you might’ve wanted, which gives you the opportunity to circle back and engage these students in other ways.

With these two options, you’re all prepped and ready to run a career exploration class with a clear indicator of success!

So with everything said and done, let’s talk about one big question we haven’t answered yet.

How do you actually teach career exploration?

6. How Do You Teach Career Exploration?

When it comes to teaching a career exploration curriculum, there are hundreds of options available.

Mainly, you'll find career exploration lessons and activities for middle school, which is the most common age group where career exploration is taught.

Most of the resources you can find online can be a great supplement to fill out an existing career readiness curriculum.

However, if you’re in need of a full curriculum to teach career exploration among other concepts and skills, consider checking out iCEV's comprehensive career exploration curriculum . 

iCEV's curriculum contains hundreds of hours of content to help you teach dozens of career readiness skills through hands-on activities, engaging digital lessons, and more.

It’s a great option for anyone who is just getting started as a career readiness teacher and needs materials to fill their entire course.

To see if the curriculum is the right fit for your classes,  download a free introduction activity and try it out for yourself. 

This career exploration activity helps your students identify possible career choices and think about the steps needed to obtain those careers.

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Home | Blog | 8 Hands-On FCS Tools for Middle School Career Exploration

8 Hands-On FCS Tools for Middle School Career Exploration

The more middle school career exploration opportunities students have , the better their understanding will be of the working world and what they want to do in it. Family and Consumer Science (FCS) careers in particular are in high demand as opportunities in child care expand and open positions in the food industry increase . That’s why we’ve put together t his list of hands-on tools and activities to help middle school students explor e FCS careers .  

1. Child Care Center Design Kit

Our interactive Child Care Center Design Kit includes curriculum and activities to introduce students to best practices for arranging learning center rooms, an essential skill for future child care professionals. Each kit includes five individual trays containing a dry erase board, marker, microfiber cloth, three sets of age-appropriate furniture tiles, and a photo key card. This kit is perfect for middle school career exploration as students learn about child care center careers before they get the opportunity to design their own center!  

The included curriculum takes approximately three hours to complete. It covers child care career explor ation; guidelines and best practices for classroom design; and infant, toddler, and preschool classroom design. The curriculum comes with presentation slides, student activities, and assessments.  

We recommend t wo kits for a 20- student class exploring FCS content areas and human services careers .  

Use this kit to explore careers in infant-related education and human services as well as early childhood development services.   

Add soft skills practice with these supplemental scenario cards: Child Care Career , Employability , and Leadership

2. The Quints

Use our Quints package to introduce fundamental child care and pediatric career skills, such as the importance of child abuse prevention and how to care for premature infants. Students will be able to interact with five realistic simulators: 

• Shaken Baby effectively demonstrates how an infant’s brain is affected after just a few seconds of shaking
• Our Drug-Affected Baby emits the cries and displays the withdrawal tremors of a drug-affected infant
• Our Fetal Alcohol Syndrome Baby shows the possible physical effects of prenatal alcohol use
• Preemie Baby , which resembles a preterm infant born at 30 weeks
• Our Down Syndrome Baby helps boost awareness and understanding of births with down syndrome

Each Baby comes with its own curriculum for five to nine hours of teaching time. Some lesson topics include understanding prenatal drug , meth, and alcohol exposure ; understanding shaken baby syndrome ; and all about premature infants. There curricula are g reat for aiding in middle school career exploration into paths involving infants and the common medical issues they face .    

We recommend o ne package for a 20- student class exploring careers in FCS , human services, and health science.  

Use this package to explore careers in childbirth; substance abuse prevention during pregnancy; infant-related education and human services; shaken baby syndrome education, prevention, and treatment; early childhood development and services; counseling and mental health services; family and community services; and more!   

Add soft skills practice with these supplemental scenario cards: Child Care Career, Employability, Leadership, Nursing Career , Medical Assistant Career , and EMT Career

3. Education and Training Career Exploration Kit

Explore careers in early childhood, elementary, and secondary education as well as others with our Education and Training Career Exploration Kit . It includes student workbooks , Education and Training Career Scenario Cards , a classroom poster on this career cluster and related occupations, online access to slide presentation s , and spiral-bound curriculum.  

The included curriculum has five different lesson topics. For instance, students will explore careers in administration and administrative support careers as well as professional support services. It takes approximately six to seven hours to complete the curriculum which includes student activities and assessments. It can be used all on its own or it can supplement your existing curriculum.  

We recommend two kits for a 20- student middle school career exploration class exploring FCS as well as human service s .  

Add soft skills practice with these supplemental scenario cards: Child Care Career, Employability, and Leadership

4. RealCareer ® Food Safety Kit

The RealCareer ® Food Safety Kit covers basic food safety and handling techniques used in culinary careers ( and at home). It includes curriculum, presentation slides, 12 food safety posters, six bottles of Glo Germ ™ Gel, and more! The hands-on activities and group work make this kit excellent for both middle school career exploration and improving soft skills like teamwork.  

The curriculum has six different lesson topics. Students will explore topics such as basic food safety and foodborne illnesses. They’ll also explore culinary and food service careers.  

We recommend t wo kits for a 20- student class exploring culinary arts careers.  

Use this kit to explore careers in restaurant and food/beverage services, nutrition and wellness, food products and processing, food science and technology, and human services food and nutrition.  

Add soft skills practice with these supplemental scenario cards: Culinary Career and Food Processing, Production and Safety Career    

5. Food Truck Design Kit

The Food Truck Design Kit provides a hands-on design experience for students exploring food truck businesses. This interactive learning aid allows for optimal student interaction and learning while planning all elements of a food truck business. It includes five trays each with a dry erase marker, microfiber cloth, two gridded dry erase boards, and two sets of furniture tiles.  

The included curriculum has five different lesson topics including marketing for food trucks, budget management for a food truck business, and menu development. It takes approximately 18 hours to complete the curriculum which includes presentation slides, student activities, and assessments.    

We recommend t wo kits for a 20- student middle school career exploration class covering culinary arts and/or business and marketing careers.  

Use this kit to explore careers in restaurants and food/beverage services, business management, entrepreneurship, business finance, and marketing.

6. Kitchen Safety Kit

Our Kitchen Safety Kit introduces basic kitchen s safety concepts and techniques to your students in an easy-to-use , one-week unit . It includes a trivia card game, six sets of posters, Glo Germ Oil and Powder, and more! This kit is perfect for working middle school career exploration into any classroom as it can be use d with any textbook or curriculum you currently have.  

Th is kit’s curriculum has five different lessons. Topics include introduction to kitchen safety ; sanitation ; knife safety ; and prevention of burns, falls, and electrical and chemical hazards . It takes approximately five hours to complete the curriculum, which includes presentation slides, student activities, and assessments.  

We recommend t wo kits for a 20-person class covering culinary arts careers.  

Use this kit to explore careers in plant systems; agriculture, food, and natural resources; restaurants and food/beverage services; nutrition and wellness; food products and processing; food science and technology; and human services food and nutrition.    

Add soft skills practice with these supplemental scenario cards: Culinary Careers as well as Food Processing, Production and Safety  

7. Food Science and Nutrition Lab Kit

Our unique Food Science and Nutrition Lab Kit introduces students to food science and nutrition concepts, essential for a variety of culinary and food science careers. It includes student workbooks ; 12 posters; Food Processing, Production and Safety Career Scenario Cards ; and more!  

O ur included curriculum features seven different lessons covering topics such as career planning, food safety, and introduction to nutrition . It takes approximately 17 to 22 hours to complete the curriculum . It’s great for middle school career exploration as it comes with presentation slides, hands-on student activities, thought-provoking scenarios, and assessments.    

We recommend tw o kits for a 20-person class covering agriculture and culinary arts career s .  

8. RealCare ® Pregnancy Profile Simulator

The RealCare ® Pregnancy Profile Simulator depicts the third trimester of pregnancy, a great experience for introducing further discussion of nursing and child care careers. This wearable pregnancy vest and curriculum helps students understand pregnancy’s impact on the body, life goals, finances, relationships, and emotions. It includes a rib constrictor belt with two plastic balls, water bladder, bladder pressure weight bag, and more .  

The included curriculum has 12 different lessons. Topics include the physical changes of pregnancy, impact on life goals, and pregnancy symptoms. It takes approximately 20 to 25 hours to complete all the curriculum which comes with presentation slides, student activities, and assessments. The curriculum also aligns to Common Core State Standards and Common Technical Core Standards.  

We recommend t wo simulators for a 20-person middle school career exploration class covering FCS , health sciences, and therapeutic services careers.  

Use this simulator to explore careers in c hildbirth; substance abuse prevention during pregnancy; shaken baby syndrome education, prevention, and treatment; therapeutic services; medical assistance; and nursing.    

Add soft skills practice with these supplemental scenario cards : Child Care Career, Nursing Career, Medical Assistant Career, and EMT Career  

If you’re looking for information on middle school career exploration opportunities, we suggest:  

• Our free career exploration curriculum , which introduces students to in-demand careers within culinary arts and food science, FCS, human services, and more  
• This free guide on using scenarios to explore careers:

• Our blogs on middle school career exploration in trades , agriculture , and health science
• This brochure  on FCS career options from the American Association of FCS  
• Realityworks Product Manager Denise DuBois shares a variety of tips, resources and best practices in her webinar, Exploring FCS Careers With Middle School Students:

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The Complete Guide to Career Exploration for Teens and Their Teachers

Students have a lot to consider as they make plans for life after high school. Career exploration can help students make, and feel confident about, their next steps. Download this resource to refer back to or share. 

How can we expect students to choose a career path that doesn't exist yet?

We may not be able to tell them what jobs will exist in the future, but we can help students make logical, informed decisions. We do this by inviting them to engage in career exploration. Exploring a variety of career paths and occupations, as well as relevant labor market information, helps students become equipped to make informed decisions that they feel good about. 

To skip straight to a section, click on the topic in the table of contents

Want to save or share? Fill out the form to download this page as a pdf.

What is career exploration.

Career exploration is “the exploration of the environment and the self with the aim of gathering career-related information.” It is a vital step in the career development process that students often first encounter as they begin to plan for life after high school. Although students need to engage in career exploration to make informed decisions regarding their post-secondary path, career exploration is not limited to this time of life. Instead, it is a continual process that individuals participate in as they progress through life.

Sometimes career exploration arises from necessity, as with students nearing graduation who must choose between different post-secondary education programs or when adults experience restructuring and subsequent job loss. Other times career exploration results from an internal desire to seek new opportunities. Whatever the case, it is becoming increasingly relevant for students to learn how to engage in career exploration since research shows that, on average, people now have five to seven careers in their lifetime. Career exploration is the key to equipping students not only for post-secondary success but for life-long professional adaptability.

Career Exploration is a cyclical, reflective, hands-on, trial and error process.

The career exploration process requires research and experimentation by the individual. This is the time for students to take an inventory of what they know about themselves and to begin looking for potential careers that interest them. But beyond just researching, they also need to explore through hands-on experiences in the classroom or through work and volunteer opportunities. Even investing in their hobbies is a valuable part of the exploration process. Like any good scientist, once students have completed their experiment, they need to reflect and draw their conclusions. Did they actually like the kind of work they completed? Is the career they were exploring compatible with their interests, skills, and values? Depending on how they answer these questions and others, they will either research new career options or they will research the next steps as they draw up a plan.

Why is Career Exploration Important for Students?

Career exploration is important for students because it helps them set informed goals and motivates them to achieve those goals. Let’s take a look at how career exploration accomplishes this. 

1. Career exploration exposes students to the myriad of career pathways that exist. 

Did you know that the Standard Occupational Classification (SOC) includes 867 detailed occupations? Or that Canada’s National Occupational Classification (NOC) lists approximately 30,000 different job titles? That said, neither the SOC nor the NOC “attempt to provide an exhaustive list of job titles.” Instead, these lists aim “to cover the most commonly used and universally understood labels that identify work” in their respective labor markets. In other words, a list of 30,000 occupations does not cover all the jobs that exist in a single country. Given the tremendous number of job titles and opportunities, it is impossible for students to be aware of all their options without dedicating time and attention to career exploration. 

Discover how ChatterHigh personalizes career exploration for students.

2. Career exploration introduces students to labor market realities. 

Exposing students to the plethora of occupations within the labor market is a vital piece of career exploration. However, to help youth make informed career choices, it’s important to also teach them about a couple of fundamental economic principles: supply and demand. Of course, the economy is ever-evolving as technology continues to transform how people work and what kinds of jobs exist. So it’s impossible to tell your students exactly what the job market will look like by the time they are ready to enter the workforce. It’s possible that the jobs your students will one day have don’t exist yet. It’s also possible the jobs they’re dreaming of will change. However, by introducing them to trends in the economy and relevant labor market information, you can help your students gain insight into what areas of study will prepare them for tomorrow’s economy.

Check out “NOC, SOC, and Roll: How ChatterHigh Connects Students to Labor Market Information.”

3. Career exploration helps students make informed decisions and plans for their future. 

According to Sareena Hopkins, Executive Director at Canadian Career Development Foundation, an informed decision is based on self-awareness and opportunity awareness. So, to make an informed decision, students must learn about themselves and the different options available to them. And this is precisely where career exploration comes into play. Career exploration is the vehicle for building opportunity awareness. Active career exploration does more than simply list a number of post-secondary pathways available to students. Instead, it allows students to discover the skills, knowledge, and values involved in different jobs. Through exploring occupations, students gain relevant knowledge concerning job responsibilities, work environment, training requirements, remuneration, and more. As a result, they are equipped to make informed decisions. 

ChatterHigh fills an important gap in supporting opportunity awareness. It exposes individuals to a wide range of post-secondary options, industry sectors and occupations. This is vital for anyone, but particularly critical for young people who may have had limited access to social capital and limited exposure to the range of possibilities that exist in post-secondary and labor market systems. - Sareena Hopkins, Executive Director, Canadian Career Development Foundation

4. Career exploration helps students evaluate career pathways according to their values, skills, and interests. 

Since career exploration involves exploring the environment and the self, it requires students to reflect on themselves and the variety of job opportunities they’ve discovered. Since this exploration is not simply a mental exercise but requires hands-on experience, students will be able to test their hypotheses. That is, students can try out their career of choice through job shadowing, work or volunteer experience, or developing a new hobby. Then they can decide whether this career pathway is truly compatible with their values, skills, and interests. Considering the role that intrinsic motivation plays in job satisfaction , it’s important that we help students discover careers that interest them and allow them to use their skills. And career exploration is one key way we can do this.

5. Career exploration can help cultivate hope in students.  

Hope can be defined as the cognitive combination of agency and pathways. In other words, hope is where “goal-directed determination” and the “planning of ways to meet goals” intersect. That’s because knowing what our goal is, believing we can achieve it, and having a plan to achieve it shows us that our goal is attainable. And that’s precisely what career exploration does for students. Not every student who dreams of travelling to the moon is going to become an astronaut, but career exploration shows them that there is a path that leads to that outcome. It may be hard. It may not be the right fit for the student. They may even discover something better for them along the way. The beauty of career exploration is that it can help students feel more confident as they begin their post-secondary education. And if they do discover their original goal isn’t right for them, they can pursue a new interest and set a different goal. 

Interested in finding a way to help foster hope in your students? Check out ChatterHigh’s gamified platform that uses inquiry-based learning to expose students to a variety of career and post-secondary options. ChatterHigh’s approach has been proven to produce a wide range of positive outcomes, including making students feel more hopeful about their future. Ready to start exploring? Create your account now or book a demo .

When to Introduce Your Students to Career Exploration

It’s never too early to begin career exploration, especially when it’s engaging. In fact, to equip students to make informed decisions with minimal stress, we should begin career exploration by middle school.

Why Middle School is the Perfect Time for Students to Explore Careers

Middle school is the ideal time to introduce your students to career exploration for three main reasons. First, middle school students want to engage in career exploration. Second, middle school students benefit more from career intervention than their high school peers. Third, in high school, students are choosing courses that form their educational pathway and determine their post-secondary opportunities. 

>> Learn more about the benefits of early career exploration <<

Because career exploration is a continual process, there are benefits to bringing it into the classroom well before high school and it should be worked into all subject areas. Research shows that higher levels of career planfulness can result in heightened school engagement. Highlighting future career relevancy can also help to answer the age-old question, “When will I ever use this stuff?!” In a world where the average worker will have five to seven different careers during their lifetime, it is valuable to practice career exploration as an ongoing activity. So let’s take a look at exactly how we can get our students engaged in this exploratory process. 

How to Bring Career Exploration into the Classroom

There are a variety of ways to successfully bring career exploration into your classroom, no matter the age of your students.

"Career development is a lifelong process. At the elementary level, students are already making choices that will impact their future. It is important to expose students to these key career concepts early in their school careers. Having students reflect on their learning, choices, and who they are as individuals, students and learners will impact their social, emotional, academic, and career growth and development throughout school." - Newfoundland and Labrador Career Development Elementary Curriculum Guide , 2017

Regardless of whether or not career education is a separate subject in your region’s curriculum, you can use some of the following ideas to bring career exploration into your classroom. These activities can be integrated into different subjects, from language arts to math, and are a great way to help engage your students.

1. Take Our Kids to Work Day

Encourage your students to participate in Take Our Kids to Work Day. This is a fantastic opportunity for students to experience a day in the life of a professional. If your school isn’t participating in this day, consider implementing it yourself. To make the most of this event, you might consider creating a reflection assignment or a presentation. Sharing what they’ve learned in front of their class not only gets students thinking, but it also gets them educating one other.

2. Guest Speakers

Consider inviting professionals into your classroom as well. Bringing in guest speakers from the field is a great way to show students the relevance of what they’re learning in your classroom, while also helping them discover and learn more about potential careers. This is an especially great way to do career exploration with elementary students. 

If you want to find speakers from specific fields that interest your students, consider having your students (from Grades 6 to 12) complete the ChatterHigh Daily Quiz . As students quiz, they rate their interest in the programs of study and jobs that they encounter during the quiz. As their teacher, you can see a classwide summary of all their interests and select a speaker accordingly. (Find out more here .)

3. Brochures

Encourage your students to swing by your school’s guidance office to check out some of the brochures for different colleges and universities in your area. There are so many resources online, but a physical booklet can help guide students to the information they need.

4. Skilled Trades Competitions

Take a field trip, virtually or in-person, to a skilled trades competition. Skills Compétences Canada and WorldSkills USA both host competitions that showcase a variety of skilled trades. You can even find regional competitions closer to your school. This is a great way to introduce your students to the world of trades. 

5. Career Exploration Worksheets

Take advantage of free resources such as the When I Grow Up: Career Lessons and Activities for Grades 9-12 booklet. This downloadable PDF covers skills identification and career exploration, while also including resources so your students can refine their job search and employability skills.

6. Job Fairs

Organizing a job fair at your school is a great way to introduce your students to a variety of job opportunities in one place.

7. Online Skills and Personality Assessments

There are lots of free skill and personality assessments students can explore. However, there is one assessment in particular that Grade 12 students may benefit from completing — a Plum Profile . Plum is a company that specializes in categorizing and measuring people’s recurring patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviours — what they call “talents.” By creating their own account and completing the assessment, students can learn about their preferences and strengths so they have a better understanding of the kinds of jobs and work environments that would suit them best.

8. Gamified Career Exploration 

The ChatterHigh Daily Quiz is a great bellringer activity that allows students to regularly engage in career exploration. With the ability to earn points that can be used to win prizes or donate to charity, students are motivated to complete the research activity that will expose them to all the general areas of study and help them discover interesting occupations. As a teacher, you can even access lesson plans for your region that show you how the Daily Quiz aligns with your curriculum and how you can easily incorporate it into your classroom. To learn more about the quiz, see the section "How the ChatterHigh Career Exploration Activity Works."  Or check out our blog to learn how you can get started with career exploration in your classroom in five easy steps.

How Career Exploration Complements College and Career Readiness Standards and Programs

College and career readiness is a top priority across the country. In fact, the Common Core Standards were developed to ensure that every student who graduates from high school is equipped with the fundamental skills and knowledge needed to succeed in post-secondary studies or in the workforce. However, these standards emphasize academic measures, specifically literacy and numeracy. While it is vital for students to possess these aptitudes, to truly be college- or career-ready, students must expand their awareness of opportunities in post-secondary and labor market systems. 

“Career readiness becomes refined through systematic career exploration that includes an intentional process of reality-testing career preferences. Such reality-testing occurs along a continuum ranging from personalized research, information interviews/observations, externships, internships, curricular and co-curricular experiences.” -Spencer Niles, Professor and Co-Director, THRIVE Research & Intervention Center and Editor, Counselor Education and Supervision 

Therefore, career exploration is a necessary complement to the standards.

It is worth noting that while most states adopted the Common Core Standards, a few did not. Instead, these states (Alaska, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Texas, Indiana, Virginia, and South Carolina) created their own state-specific standards , while Minnesota opted for a hybrid of state-developed standards and the Common Core Standards. 

>>Click here for a map showing college- and career-readiness policies by state.<<

Unlike the Common Core Standards, some of the state-developed standards address college and career readiness through specific courses and curricula. For example, the Texas curriculum includes courses such as Investigating Careers and College and Career Readiness , while Minnesota's state-specific standards dictate that school districts are responsible for helping students “ explore their educational, college, and career interests, aptitudes, and aspirations and develop a plan for a smooth and successful transition to postsecondary education or employment .”

Regardless of whether a state’s standards explicitly address post-secondary planning or career exploration, states can further promote college and career readiness through adopting other programs and initiatives, such as dual enrollment opportunities, Career Technical Education (CTE), Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP), and more. To learn more about these programs, click on the tabs below.

" Dual enrollment " is a term referring to any program that allows high school students to complete college courses. Most often, a student who participates in a dual enrollment opportunity will receive a credit at both the high school and college levels. While these dual credit opportunities are common throughout the country, they are not all identical. In some cases, a student will complete a dual enrollment course at their high school, while in other cases they will attend a local college or complete it online. Regardless of the format, dual enrollment opportunities allow students to take advantage of more subject-specific courses that align with their interests. If a student is considering a certain career path, participating in a dual enrollment program can allow them to get a taste of that field to see if they want to continue down that path, before they’ve officially enrolled in a college or university program.

To learn about the dual enrollment programs in your state, click here .

Career Technical Education (CTE) refers to “ education that combines academic and technical skills with the knowledge and training needed to succeed in today’s labor market.” Unlike traditional vocational education, CTE is not designed for a narrow segment of the student population. Rather, CTE derives its structure from the 16 Career Clusters in the National Career Clusters Framework, which include jobs from a wide variety of industries, such as manufacturing, agriculture, business, health care, and more. In this way, students with various vocational goals can benefit from CTE. Furthermore, CTE can help expose students to career possibilities. To discover what CTE students have to say about it, watch the video below.

Gaining Early Awareness and Readiness for Undergraduate Programs (GEAR UP) are federal grant programs designed to help students from low-income families enter and succeed in post-secondary education. One way grants can do this is through supporting programs that focus on making students college- and career-ready. For example, Desoto Independent School District created its college and career readiness program, NXT Generation GEAR UP , with the aim of building an academic community that will foster student success in post-secondary education.

AVID is an organization that provides a specialized curriculum that schools can purchase to prepare students for life after high school. Through access to professional development, resources, and support, AVID equips teachers and students all for the benefit of students. AVID partners with both primary and secondary schools so that students receive the education they need to prepare them for college and career success. In fact, the “college-going culture of an AVID Elementary campus encourages students to think about their college and career plans .” In this way, not only does AVID help equip students with the skills needed for academic success, but it also creates the perfect environment for meaningful career exploration. 

How the ChatterHigh Career Exploration Activity Works

ChatterHigh offers students a divergent career exploration experience through our 10-question Daily Quiz. The powerful algorithm behind the quiz allows students to discover countless post-secondary programs and career pathways, while also offering personalization as students progress through the activity. Here’s how it works.

Book a demo to learn more about ChatterHigh career exploration activities. hbspt.cta._relativeUrls=true;hbspt.cta.load(8361206, '31fefa79-0b9e-4921-839b-7b2bad56de22', {"useNewLoader":"true","region":"na1"});

Students receive questions relating to post-secondary education and career paths, as well as health, financial literacy, and labor market resources. After reading their question, students click “Research.”

Step 2 

Students are taken to the webpage containing the answer. Once they’ve found the answer, they return to the ChatterHigh site where they submit their response.

Students complete the Interest and Awareness Survey for the question they’ve just answered.

After answering a question about a post-secondary program or a career, students receive an Interest and Awareness Survey, which is a brief, 4-question survey. The first two questions are about the organization, while the last two are about the program or job. Indicating their level of interest allows the platform to learn what kinds of questions to tailor to the students after the students have answered 100 questions. The first 100 questions are dedicated to divergent exploration so that students are exposed to all the general areas of study. After answering 100 questions, a couple of questions in each quiz are personalized to the student based on the interests they’ve previously indicated in their surveys. (To learn more about the benefits of ChatterHigh’s personalized career exploration activity, check out this blog .)

Students review and reflect on their exploration by clicking on “Interests” at the top of their screen. 

Thanks to the Interest and Awareness Survey, everything that catches a student’s attention while they quiz (that is, anything they rank as “Interesting” or “Very Interesting”) is recorded in their Interests Profile. The more they quiz, the more interests they accumulate and the more reports they unlock! There are a number of helpful reports available to students within the Interests Profile. In particular, the Top 5 Interest Report allows students to compare their top five colleges and universities, programs of study, and jobs and careers. (Click here to learn about how the Top 5 Interest Report can help your students reflect on their post-secondary options.)

Students use the points they’ve earned from quizzing to enter prize draws or to donate to charity. 

The chance to win prizes and donate to charity motivates students to engage in career exploration, particularly during a competition. (Click here to find out when our next national competition is happening.)

Have a Question or Want a Closer Look at ChatterHigh's Career Exploration Activity?

Feel free to contact us or book a demo. We’d be happy to answer any questions you may have. Don't forget, you can download this entire page as a pdf to refer back to or share with colleagues. 

• Career Exploration
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• Grants Program
• Internship Credit
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• Civic Engagement

20+ Questions to Jump-start Your Career Exploration

Below you will find questions meant to prompt your career exploration. Take time to reflect on each question, as a strong understanding of yourself will be essential to effectively navigate the twists and turns of your unique career path. Get to know your values, personality type, strengths, and interests, as these all deeply inform your satisfaction with career choice.

It is perfectly normal if you do not immediately know the answers to some of these questions; these are intentionally difficult questions. Some of your answers will remain constant throughout your career, while others will shift and adjust as you and your career continue to grow and develop. Remember this is not the finish line; it is just the beginning and you should return to these questions often. With each new experience comes the opportunity to reflect on how you’ve grown, changed, and evolved, and to evaluate where that may lead you next.

• What is important to me?
• What careers seem interesting to me? Why?
• Who has influenced my ideas about my career options?
• What jobs might I consider as a parallel plan? (Plan B, Plan C, etc.)
• What career paths can I cross off my list?
• How do I want to be remembered?
• What impact do I want to make on the world?
• What topics and ideas spark my curiosity?
• What do I “geek” over? What could I talk about for hours?
• What do I have to offer others?
• What comes naturally to me?
• How do I like to spend my time?
• What are my favorite classes, and why?
• What extracurricular activities do I enjoy? What have I learned about myself from participating in the activities?
• Who do I look up to? What about them inspires or motivates me?
• What personal qualities do I view as my strengths?
• What activities make me feel happy or energized?
• When do I feel most comfortable and at ease?
• What are the biggest lessons I’ve learned so far?
• How do I define success?
• If I were guaranteed success, what would I do?
• When have I been most inspired or most motivated?
• If I could choose a tattoo for myself, what might it be? Why?
• If I had a magic wand, what would I do for a year?

Make an appointment with your Advisor for Career Exploration (ACE) to discuss these topics and explore different types of assessment and reflection activities. Your ACE will help you reflect on your experiences throughout college so that you graduate with a strong sense of self and goals for your future.

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Fashion Business School

International fair “education and career” in moscow.

Since 1994 the International Fair “Education and Career” has been held twice a year in Moscow. “Education and Career” is a widely acknowledged, respected and largest event in educational life of Russia, which is attended by students, language teachers, study abroad/travel agents, educational advisers, journalists and officials.

MOD’SPE Paris Central Europe will provide students with more information during this fair.

March 3-4, 2016 Moscow, Central Manege, Manezhnaya square, 1 Stand I5

More information and free tickets