Career Planning Workbook

This workbook is fantastic to help teenagers to think about and plan for their future careers. You will see from the contents page that it starts with a series of self reflection exercises, then moves onto identifying skills and abilities, and then onto identifying suitable careers. Finally it focuses on specific job hunting skills like C.V. writing and interview preparation.

A teacher can make a full lesson out of each exercise, for example, do a C.V. writing workshop, get in a guest speaker, watch relevant videos, and then complete the C.V. writing exercise in the workbook. This means that the workbook can be the basis for an entire short course on career planning, giving you the content and structure for ten or more lessons, depending on how much delivery and additional activities you want to add around each exercise. It also allows for the teacher to add stretch exercises for more able learners by providing additional activities around each subject area, or by adding additional instructions to make each exercise more challenging. The workbook is provided in Word format so that you can amend and add to as you wish.

Additional activities to support each exercise could be:

*Subject specific crosswords and word-searches
*Completing a real job application form

• Reading real job adverts and writing mock letters or emails responding to them
  *Getting in guest speakers (recruiters, careers guidance staff, local employers)
  *Going on trips to local employers or the local employment offices
  *Visiting careers fairs and university open days (more relevant to slightly older teens)
  *Watching videos/documentaries
  *Interview role plays with each other, or with a guest they don’t know to make it more authentic

This workbook gives plenty of opportunities to embed English reading, writing and comprehension skills. It also can link to British Values, leading into discussions around equality and diversity in employment, and respect and professional behaviour in the workplace. You can also embed Maths by doing sessions on expected salaries and household budgeting.

Print off so each student has their own copy to work through, or complete soft copy on computers.