Life Career Management Skills

Activity 1: Effective Student Skills

Foundational Objective: Skills to establish good work and study habits.

Learning Objectives:

The student will:

• define basic student skills.
• identify ways to acquire effective student skills.
• understand how effective student skills can lead to effective work habits.

C.E.L.s: COM, CCT, IL, PSVS, NUM

Materials:

• paper
• overhead No. 1 "Time Management"
• pencil or pen
• handout No. 1 "Student Skills Inventory"

Time: One - two class periods.

Activity:

1. Discuss the importance of effective time management with the class. For a period of one week, students could keep track of their out-of-school activities and of the amount of time spent on each one. Students could prepare a chart like the one displayed on the overhead No. 1 "Time Management". At the end of the week, ask students to analyze their charts and suggest ways to plan their time better. Students may compare their time charts with those of their classmates if they wish. Students should be encouraged to graph (pie or bar) how they use their time.

2. Ask students to complete part A of the Student Skills Inventory handout No. 1 and allow them to discuss their answers with the class.

3. Ask students to complete part B of the handout.

4. Ask volunteers what they have learned about themselves in this lesson and how they can improve their student skills. Make sure that students understand how effective student skills can lead to effective work habits and to success in an occupation.

5. In a small group, have students develop a list about how they can improve "Note Taking Skills", and "Preparing for and Taking Exams". Share responses with the rest of the class. Responses can also be put on chart paper and hung around the classroom.

Additional Activities:

When and Where? - Have students, in groups, identify the necessary features of an appropriate location for studying or doing homework. They can also prepare a list of appropriate places and suggest which is the best time of day for studying. The groups can compare answers and compile a master list.

Evaluation:

Source: One step at a time, Educational and Career Explorations, Intermediate Division, Ministry of Education, Ontario, 1984.

Grade 7 Module: Life Career Management Skills
Overhead No. 1 "Time Management"

For printing and copying this template Requires Acrobat Reader (click on the table title)

Grade 7 Module: Life Career Management Skills
Handout No. 1 "Students Skills Inventory"

Source: One step at a time, Educational and Career Explorations, Intermediate Division, Ministry of Education, Ontario, 1984.

Grade 7 Module: Life Career Management Skills
Handout No. 1 "Students Skills Inventory"

Activity 2: Why Decision-Making Skills Are Important

Foundational Objective: Awareness of and knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to set goals and to make appropriate decisions.

Learning Objectives:

The student will:

• understand the importance of decision-making skills.
• learn to ask general questions concerning a problem.
• identify problem-solving and decision-making techniques.

C.E.L.s: COM, CCT, IL, PSVS

Materials:

• student notebooks
• handout No. 2 "Questions and Alternatives"
• student journals
• handout No. 3 "What Are the Alternatives?"
• pen or pencil
• paper

Time: Two class periods.

Activity:

1. Discuss the importance of decision-making skills with the class. Discuss any decision-making models that students have used. Tell students that the first step in effective decision-making is the ability to ask clear, general questions. Such questions explain clearly what the person is hoping to decide and allow the person a wide range of choices. Remind students that general statements such as "I wonder what I should wear today", or very specific questions such as "Should I give my mother a flower for Mother's Day?" will hinder their ability to make a decision. The examples given above should be reworded in the form of clear, general questions before any attempt at making a decision. The examples can be changed to: "What might I wear to school today?" and "What can I give my mother for Mother's Day?" These are clear, general questions.

2. Distribute the Questions and Alternatives handout No. 2 and ask students to complete part A. Discuss students' answers.

3. Tell students that the next step in a decision-making procedure is to list as many alternative courses of action (or answers to the question) as possible. Ask students to complete part B of the Questions and Alternatives handout. Discuss the answers with the class.

4. Have the students respond to the questions on handout No. 3 "What Are the Alternatives?"

5. Review the major steps in the decision-making model. Have students copy them into their notebooks.
   
   Decision-Making Model
   
   
   1. Identify the decision to be made
      
   2. Gather information
      
   3. Identify the alternatives
      
   4. Weigh the evidence
      
   5. Choose among alternatives
      
   6. Take action
      
   7. Review the decision

6. Role Playing Activity: Have students role play various decisions that they have made. Share with the large group.

Additional Activities:

In small groups, have students discuss three case scenarios where a decision is necessary (i.e., ... to stay in school or drop out). Using the decision-making model, have students work through the process in each of the three case scenarios discussed.

Evaluation:

Resources:

For printing and copying this template Requires Acrobat Reader (click on the table title)

Source: One step at a time, Educational and Career Explorations, Intermediate Division, Ministry of Education, Ontario, 1984.

Grade 7 Module: Life Career Management Skills
Handout No. 2 "Questions and Alternatives"

For printing and copying this template Requires Acrobat Reader (click on the table title)

Source: One step at a time, Educational and Career Explorations, Intermediate Division, Ministry of Education, Ontario, 1984.

Grade 7 Module: Life Career Management Skills
Handout No. 3 "What Are the Alternatives?"

Activity 3: Obstacles in Making Decisions

Foundational Objective: Awareness of and knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to set goals and to make appropriate decisions.

Learning Objectives:

The student will:

• identify and assess problems that interfere with attaining goals.
• gain an awareness that obstacles are part of everyday life and can be overcome.

C.E.L.s: COM, CCT, PSVS, IL

Materials:

• student journals
• handout No. 4 "Obstacles in Making Decisions"
• pencil or pen

Time: One class period.

Activity:

1. Discuss "internal feelings section" on the handout.

2. Have students fill out the "Obstacles in Making Decisions" handout sheet. Alternatively, you may wish to make handout #4 into an overhead transparency and complete it with the entire class.

3. Discuss in groups the problems students have in making decisions.

4. Have students suggest ways in which they can overcome these obstacles when they make decisions.

5. Have students review "Step-By-Step Decision-Making Procedure" (Steps 1 through 7 on the bottom of handout #4).

6. As a wind up activity, have students complete the following statement in their journals:
   From this activity, I learned that ...

Additional Activities:

Have students complete the same form using a decision they had to make in the past.

Evaluation:

For printing and copying this template Requires Acrobat Reader (click on the table title)

Obstacles in Making Decisions

Directions:   Think of a decision you will have to make in the near future. Next, identify obstacles that may interfere with your decision-making. Place each obstacle in the appropriate column according to how much impact that obstacle will have on your decision-making. Also, circle any internal feelings (in column four) you may be having regarding this decision and add any others that you are feeling that are not listed.

STEP-BY-STEP DECISION-MAKING PROCEDURE


1. Identify the decision to be made
   
2. Gather information
   
3. Identify the alternatives
   
4. Weigh the evidence
   
5. Choose among alternatives
   
6. Take action
   
7. Review the decision

Source: Developmental guidance classroom activities, Vocational Studies Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1991. Reprinted with permission.

Handout No. 4

Activity 4: Why Goal Setting is Important

Foundational Objective: Awareness of and knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to set goals and to make appropriate decisions.

Learning Objectives:

The student will:

• demonstrate setting goals and developing action plans.
• be encouraged to set short term goals that are attainable.

C.E.L.s: COM, CCT, IL, PSVS

Materials:

• paper
• pencil
• student journals

Time: One class period.

Activity:

1. Discuss why it is worthwhile to set goals and make plans. Some reasons are:
   • to prepare a person for day-to-day decisions;
   • to enable a person to carry through with his/her decisions;
   • to allow a person to get things done in an orderly fashion.

   Next discuss the obstacles to planning. These include:

   • limited understanding of self
   • poor decision-making skills
   • trial-and-error approach
   • conflicts with others
   • lack of self-confidence
   • need for compromise
   • fear of the future
   • inability to think far enough ahead

   Brainstorm with students a variety of goal-setting skills. Talk about the kinds of things that they can try to change, including:

   • interests
   • personality traits
   • self-defeating behaviour
   • skills

   Students should understand that goals must have the following characteristics:

   • be attainable (for example, students who are colour-blind cannot become pilots);
   • be specific (for example, "We must have you over sometime" vs. "Would you like to come to dinner on Saturday?");
   • be stated and attainable within a definite period of time;
   • be consistent with the person's values;
   • be achievable without depending on someone else, although other people can help.

2. Once students understand goal setting, ask each one to set:
   • two goals that can be achieved within one week, for example, to pass the next math test;
   • two goals that can be achieved within one month, for example, to join the basketball team;
   • two educational goals (short-term);
   • two tentative career goals (long-term).

3. Show students how to develop detailed plans of action for achieving their goals. Students can develop a plan for each one of their goals. The plans should include a number of specific steps to accomplish their goal. For example, Mary's goal is to pass the next math test. Her plan of action might include the following steps:
   • to go to every math class;
   • to listen carefully in class;
   • to ask questions when she does not understand something;
   • to ask her teacher for after-school help;
   • to do all her math homework;
   • to study math every day for at least one-half hour.

4. Have students think of an important goal in their lives (immediate or future) and illustrate it in some way (cartoons, story, poem, or song). Students may want to share with the class or put work on the bulletin board.

Additional Activities:

Did I Succeed? - After one week and after one month, check with students individually to see how successful each one was in achieving his/her goals. If a student failed to achieve a goal, encourage the student to:
(a) set an alternate goal; or
(b) make a plan designed to overcome the obstacle that prevented him/her from achieving the goal.

Ask teachers in other subject areas to help students set goals and prepare plans for the successful completion of tests or assignments.

Evaluation:

Resources:

Adapted from One step at a time, Educational and Career Explorations, Intermediate Division, Ministry of Education, Ontario, 1984.

Activity 5: Occupations of the Future

Foundational Objective: Awareness of change and knowledge, skills, and attitudes needed to cope with life transitions.

Learning Objectives:

The student will:

• describe the effects that societal, economic, and technological change have on occupations.
• describe the importance of being able to change.
• research future occupations.

C.E.L.s: COM, CCT, IL, PSVS, TL

Materials:

• magazine
• construction paper
• glue

Time: One - two class periods.

Background Information:

Cover Story:

City doctors lead way in video-screen surgery by Star Phoenix

In an amazing two-hour operation last week, a surgical team at City Hospital took out a 72-year-old woman's cancerous kidney without slicing open her abdomen. Surgeons managed to take out the bean-shaped organ that's about the size of a fist with only four tiny incisions. Using a kidney removal procedure pioneered in Saskatchewan and tried elsewhere in Canada fewer than a dozen times, they deftly manipulated long surgical instruments through tiny tubes, relying on sophisticated video equipment to guide them.

The operating room appeared almost bloodless. The patient, Frances McKay of Rosetown, was walking around the next day with little pain and went home after three days. "I'm thrilled about it," she said afterwards. "I sure would recommend it."

It's the latest application of laparoscopy or "minimal access surgery," a technique in which City Hospital is one of three leading centres in the country. The hospital was the first place in Western Canada to use it for such surgery as gall bladder removals, hysterectomies, hernia repairs, lung surgery, and chest and bowel tumor operations. Resident doctors come here from other parts of Canada to be trained.

Eighteen months ago, a Regina surgeon performed the first kidney laparoscopy in the country. Since then, 27 have been performed in Saskatchewan, 11 of them in Saskatoon. "A lot of people are pretty skeptical that laparoscopy is the way of the future," says Dr. Peter Barrett. It's a new way of doing things and they're sort of looking at it as a novelty. But the rest of the country has to wake up." For patients, laparoscopy means less pain, little or no scarring, shorter hospital stays and a quick return to work.

Activity:

1. Discuss cover story; then, discuss possible occupations of the future that will or may be created by new energy, such as solar power, and new technologies, such as lasers and robotics. Also discuss how changes in lifestyle may create new occupations or greater demand for some occupations.

2. Ask students to compile a list of future occupations and describe what the job requirements for some of these jobs might be.

3. Have each student describe his or her "ideal" job for the future.

4. Using magazines and construction paper, have students create a collage of pictures related to an occupation that interests them.

Additional Activities:

Role Playing: In small groups, prepare a role playing activity on a "Future Machine". Students can act out machine parts and other members of the class can guess the parts.

Research: Have students write a report on "Careers of the Future", "Technology Brings Changes", and/or "Impact of Technological Changes on Families".

Have students design a bulletin board using one of the above topics.

Evaluation:

See Appendix C for sample rating scales and assessment forms for essays and reports.

Resources:

Adapted from Developmental guidance classroom activities, Vocational Studies Center, University of Wisconsin-Madison, 1991.