This learning activity includes self-assessment and reflection which are are fundamental steps in the career planning process. It’s an essential competency that students will continue to develop over their grades 10 to 12 years. This competency will help them build their post-graduation plans and support future reality checks to ensure their career paths remain true to their personal goals and values. The Career Discovery Quizzes are a tool that students can use in their initial self-exploration and then return as they change and grow throughout their teen years.
In the Career Discovery Quizzes learning activity, students will explore career options based on their personal attributes, interests, work values and lifestyle choices. They will identify their current self-concept through the creative process of building an “I AM” collage. Next, they will construct a concept of their future using the results of the Career Discovery Quizzes to create an “I COULD BE….IN THE FUTURE” collage. The collage can be as simple as representative words or as creative as hand-drawn images. Teachers will have the opportunity to extend the activity with additional career planning tasks, supported by the resources that are available on the WorkBC website. It will provide them with a dependable way to reflect on their plans and adapt it to meet new goals and circumstances.
Worksheet A (available for download)
Other Requirements: Computer, tablet, smartphone, paper, magazines, glue, felt pens, optional example of “I AM” collage completed by the teacher.
- Abilities Quiz: Assess your talents and discover occupations that match.
- Work Preferences Quiz: Identify how you like to work and find careers that align with your preferences.
- Interests Quiz: See where your interests are and narrow your focus on careers that fit.
- Multiple Intelligences Quiz: Discover your unique way of thinking and understanding.
- Learning Styles Quiz: Determine whether you learn better by seeing, listening or doing.
- Work Values Quiz: Examine what values are important to you in your work environment.
Take the quizzes yourself so you learn how the quizzes work and the type of results that are provided. There are six quizzes to help students discover how their personal attributes relate to their career planning and choosing options and opportunities.
- Which personal attributes are most important to me? Which ones do I think I will use to help guide my life/work plans?
- When thinking about my future life/work goals what interests, work values and lifestyle choices are most important to me?
- When I took the six Career Discovery Quizzes, which results provided me with the most interesting and useful information? What did they tell me about the relationship between my personal attributes and career options? When I shared my personal collage, did my friends and family see how my interests and personal characteristics influenced my “preferred” future?
- Did this activity make me more aware of career possibilities? Did it help me refine my initial career and education goals and plan?
- Did I store my work for future reference and use in my capstone project?
Self-assessment and reflection are a fundamental step in the career planning process. It’s an essential competency that students will continue to develop over their grades 10 to 12 years. This competency will help them build their post-graduation plans and support future reality checks to ensure their career paths remain true to their personal goals and values. The Career Discovery Quizzes are a tool that students can use in their initial self-exploration and then return as they change and grow throughout their teen years. It will provide them with a dependable way to reflect on their plans and adapt it to meet new goals and circumstances.
In this learning activity, students will explore career options based on their personal attributes, interests, work values and lifestyle choices. They will identify their current self-concept through the creative process of building an “I AM” collage. Next, they will construct a concept of their future using the results of the Career Discovery Quizzes to create an “I COULD BE…IN THE FUTURE” collage. The collage can be as simple as representative words or as creative as hand-drawn images. Teachers will have the opportunity to extend the activity with additional career planning tasks, supported by the resources that are available on the WorkBC website.
- Describe how abilities, work preferences, school subjects, personal attributes, interests, and lifestyle choices influence their career options opportunities.
- Explore Career Discovery Quizzes to learn about careers that match their personal profile.
- Produce a collage of who they are now and who they could be in the future, showing how their interests and personal characteristics influence career and life options.
- Reflect on the career possibilities and begin to think about the next steps on their career journey.
This activity introduces students to the key skills that are generally required to be successful when working in a particular career field. These skills can be developed either in school or while working in the community. Introduce the activity by discussing how personal preferences, dislikes, interests and activities influence work/life choices. Paying attention to their self-concept can point them toward career choices.
Introduce an example to link the identity concept to careers—people who are in a career they love often have a strong connection with what the career says about them and often see it as an important part of their identity. It impacts where they live, what they wear and with whom they associate.
Ask students to think about the school they attend and if they were to put together a “rant”—“I AM A (name of school) HIGH SCHOOL STUDENT”—what would it say? Likely they will list things they like to do, places they like to go, people they like to be with and subjects they like to study in school.
Distribute Worksheet A and ask students to translate their thoughts into a collage titled “I AM….” Have them use words and/or images that represent who they are now, where they live, favourite activities, what they like to eat, volunteer or paid work, favourite subjects in school, other interests and talents or skills.
The next part of the learning activity will focus on helping students to think about future career options through the lens of subjects of interest, abilities and work preferences.
Introduce the learning activity by reviewing the Career Discovery Quizzes resource. Show students what some of the quiz results will look like and have then set up an electronic folder to store the quiz results.
Ask students to take the quizzes. It’s important that students are as honest as possible in their responses; a true representation of who they are now is the best starting point for finding a potential career.
Allow them enough time to complete all six Career Discovery Quizzes. Ensure they record the career options they are presented with at the end of each quiz. They can explore each option using the links to the career profiles. Once they have completed the quizzes and have determined if they like one or more of the resulting careers, ask them to create the second collage — “I COULD BE A…” — following the instructions on Worksheet A.
Remind students they will submit both their collages and reflection questions.
Self-Assessment
Ask students to provide evidence of the statements:
- By taking the Career Discovery Quizzes, I expanded my knowledge of possible career options that match my abilities, work preferences, school subjects, personal attributes, interests, and lifestyle choices.
- I built a visual representation of myself today and what my career options and prospects could be for the future.
- I created a personalized electronic record of my findings, including the most useful information for when I start creating my post-graduation plans.
Teacher Assessment
Teacher creates a rubric to evaluate the students collages.
This lesson plan supports elements of British Columbia's Career Education Curriculum as outlined below. For further details on the curriculum itself, visit the Ministry of Education's Career Education Curriculum webpage.
- Reflecting on our preferences and skills helps us identify the steps we need to take to achieve our career goals.
- Our career paths reflect the personal, community, and educational choices.
- Personal development:
- Self-assessment for career research.
- Career-life plan:
- Post-graduation opportunities.
- Examine: Use self-assessment and reflection to develop their graduation and post-graduation plans.
- Experience: Recognize the influence of curriculum choices and co-curricular activities on career paths.
- Communication:
- Acquire, interpret and present information.
- Critical thinking:
- Ask questions, consider options and draw conclusions.
