Unit Plan Teacher Laura McLaughlin Plan of Study for Pathway/Program This is a middle school class, so it’s not really a graduation requirement, but it is considered the second class in the business pathway in our district. Where does this course fit in the Career Pathway or within the school graduation requirements? Content Area/Grade Level Eighth Grade Business Course Title Leadworthy Course Description Students will develop leadership skills in personal and business areas by developing a healthy self-concept, healthy relationships, goal setting and understanding the concept of personal responsibility to help them to become better family members and citizens as they apply digital communication tools. Statement of Pacing Days Where does this unit fit into the course plan Unit Title College and Career Exploration Length 12 class periods Unit Summary Students will research careers in which they have previously identified an interest including details on salaries, education requirements, and demand. They will complete their first resume. They will research post-secondary education options for their chosen careers including school size, entrance requirements, tuition, and room and board. Students will create an activities resume for college and scholarship application purposes. Finally, they will present their findings to the class. Provide 2-4 sentences describing the main ideas content and skills of the unit. Standard(s) List the Graduation Standards, Guiding Principles, or Cross-Curricular skills this unit will address. Common Career Technical Core Standards 2. Apply appropriate academic and technical skills 4. Communicate clearly, effectively and with reason 7. Employ valid and reliable research strategies 10. Plan education and career path aligned to personal goals. 11. Use technology to enhance productivity. Language Arts Presentation of Knowledge and Ideas SL.8.4 Present claims and findings, emphasizing salient points in a focused, coherent manner with relevant evidence, sound valid reasoning, and well-chosen details; use appropriate eye contact, adequate volume, and clear pronunciation. SL.8.5 Integrate multimedia and visual displays into presentations to clarify information, strengthen claims and evidence, and add interest. SL.8.6 Adapt speech to a variety of contexts and tasks, demonstrating command of formal English when indicated or appropriate. Language in Speaking and Listening Language Arts Language in Speaking and Listening SL.8.7 Demonstrate command of the conventions of standard English grammar and usage when writing or speaking SL.8.8 Acquire and use accurately grade-appropriate general academic and domainspecific words and phrases; gather vocabulary knowledge when considering a word or phrase important to comprehension or expression. Prerequisite Skills Students will have previously completed a series of modules and lessons on Xello that include narrowing potential careers to a short list. Students must have basic research skills. They will also need the ability to use Google Slides and Google Docs. Required Resources Students will need their chromebooks, internet access and access to their Xello accounts. All required documents will be accessed digitally through students’ Canvas accounts. Learning Objectives While completing this unit, the student will develop meaningful and realistic educational and career goals. While completing this unit, students will compare career options to develop an understanding of salaries, education requirements and demand. After completing this unit, the student will both be able to create their own resume and incorporate future experiences into their resume. After completing this unit, the student will be able to differentiate between post secondary education options, including developing an understanding of entrance requirements and cost. After completing this unit, the student will create an activities resume for purposes of college and scholarship applications. Essential Question(s) These questions are related to the enduring understandings and provide relevance for the learning in the unit. Unit Questions/Content Questions What are your career plans after high school? What are the details about the careers in which I hold an interest? What post-secondary education will my future career require? Which trade schools, colleges or universities would be my best option for achieving my career goals? What are the entrance requirements, costs and other details about those schools? How do I write a resume to get job experience in high school? How do I write an activities resume to keep a record for helping to apply for colleges and scholarships? Assessment Plan Pre-assessment Determines student strengths, weaknesses, and prior knowledge of the concepts and skills addressed in the unit. At the beginning of the lesson, students will create a list of possible careers on the whiteboard that they might be interested in pursuing. Students will then discuss as a class what type of education each of these careers will require and what the cost of that education might be. (I expect students to do poorly at this because this unit is their first deep look into college planning.) Formative Students will have graphic organizers for collecting information about their careers and later their college choices. Before beginning to create their presentation, students will show me that they have been able to research to find all of the required information. Summative Assessment Task Describe what students will do and produce to develop evidence that will be evaluated using the scoring criteria. If an assessment has not been developed, the Summative Assessment Planning Template and Protocol might be helpful to guide this process. Students will complete a business resume and an activities resume to turn in, They will also create a Google Slides presentation and present this information to the class. Unit Instructional Details Day 1 & 2: I will start the unit with the essential question, “ What are your career plans after high school? Students will begin by creating a list of possible careers on the whiteboard that they might be interested in pursuing. We will then discuss as a class what type of education each of these careers will require and what the cost of that education might be. (I expect students to do poorly at this because this unit is their first deep look into college planning.) This will help students understand just how much they don’t know about life after high school. I will then introduce the unit to students explaining that they will be researching careers, colleges and creating resumes. Students will first be researching the top three careers that they chose in Xello. They will have a graphic organizer to fill with information about each career. They should start by getting basic information from Xello about the career, but they will have to continue their research in other places. This graphic organizer will ask for the following: ● Title of Job ● Brief Description of Job (What would you do?) ● Working Conditions (Inside, outside, dirty etc) ● Job Risks ● Dress Code ● Degree required to have this job ● Starting Annual Income ● Average Annual Income ● Top 10 Percent Annual Income ● In what region are you hoping to live? ● Minimum Operable Income for this region ● Is this career region specific? Can it be done anywhere? ● What is the demand for this career field? ● What travel requirements does this career have? ● What misconceptions do people have about this career? Students will begin their research on day 1, but will need day two to finish this research. I will be available to help answer questions about the worksheet and help students to locate difficult to find pieces of information. This will be our formative assessment. I will be available around the classroom answering questions and helping out and I will be able to note if students are successfully able to research their careers. Day 3: I will introduce a resume. Students will receive electronic copies of a few resume samples, including a resume of a teenager. We will discuss each part of the resume, the importance of clean formatting and how to highlight the experience and skills that they have even though most will have had no formal employment to date. Students will create their own resume. There will be lots of conversations about what is valuable to include and what format will best highlight their current skills. This will take the rest of the class period and there may even be a few lingering questions on Day 4. Day 4, 5 & 6: Today we will begin our research on potential post-secondary education options. Students will choose one or more of their career options to research. We will begin a discussion of figuring out what they want in a school. Do they want a top school in the field, do they want to commute or stay in the state of Kansas or maybe within neighboring states? At this point, I will share that I knew I didn’t want to live at home and commute to college, but I also knew that I wanted it to be possible to visit on the weekend. For this reason I chose a college just a couple hundred miles from home. My daughter felt the same way and thought she had chosen a college about the same distance from home, but also went out on a limb and applied to the top school in her field. She was accepted, offered a generous scholarship package and is currently living in New York attending college. So, just because you come up with a plan today, that doesn’t mean that it won’t change before you graduate high school. I even started with one career plan as a freshman and as a senior went in a completely different direction. (If we have potential careers that necessitate a discussion about tech schools, we will talk about that at this time also. From my last glance at Xello, I believe that all of my students have college plans.) As with careers, students will have graphic organizers to fill with information as they research. The graphic organizers will have the following questions: ● Name of college ● Location ● Local Attractions ● Size of college (number of undergraduate students) ● Public or Private ● Tuition (per year): In State, Out of State ● Average Cost of Books (per year) ● Room and Board ● Mandatory for freshmen to live on campus? ● Acceptance Rate ● Minimum ACT/SAT Score ● Minimum GPA ● Percentage of graduation rate ● Job hire rate ● Programs of Specialization ● Applicable Sports Programs ● Degree Sought ● Total Number of Credit Hour ● Significant Classes Required for Degree Students will begin their research on day 4, but will need days 5 & 6 to finish. I will be available to help answer questions about the graphic organizer and help students to locate difficult to find pieces of information. This organizer is more difficult for students to complete because university websites are not uniform and therefore some information is very difficult to locate. This will be our formative assessment. I will be available around the classroom answering questions and helping out and I will be able to note if students are successfully able to research their colleges & universities. Day 7: I will introduce students to the concept of an activities resume. I will share examples from high school students. I will emphasize the importance of keeping their activities resume updated throughout high school as a resource for applying to colleges and especially for applying for scholarships. (Some of my students are interested in Greek life in college, so I may also mention that they will also need this for recommendations for rush.) Students will create their own activities resume using their activities from Middle School. This will give them a template for a high school resume activities resume. Day 8-9: Today, students will begin creating Google Slides for a presentation about their colleges and careers. I will first remind them of the requirements of our presentation rubric. (They will have seen this 3-4 times by this point in the school year.) They will also be provided with an electronic copy of a presentation checklist for this presentation. It will contain the following content checklist: Colleges: ● Location of college ● What degree you would receive ● Tuition ● Books ● Room and Board ● Entrance Requirements Careers: ● Job title ● Degree necessary ● Job description ● Salary ● Working conditions/job risks ● Travel Requirements ● Possible locations ● Dress Code Additional Slides: ● What questions would you ask a professional in the field if you could interview him/her? (Application) ● Explain the steps you plan to take for your future to make sure you can achieve this career? (Analysis) ● Propose an idea of how to pay for schooling. (Synthesis) ● Judge the value of putting forth a strong effort in middle school and high school as to how it impacts your career. (Evaluation) I will remind students to practice giving this presentation at home to a family member or even in front of a mirror or alone so they can get a good grade on our presentation rubric in addition to our content checklist. Days 10-12: Students will present to the class. Their presentations will be the formative assessment. Accommodations for Differentiation I teach a gifted class where students are qualified into the class by their IQ falling into the top 3% of the United States. This means that I rarely need to provide accommodations. I do not expect to have students with learning disabilities, but I am familiar with dual exceptionalities (I also know that we usually fail to identify gifted students with dual exceptionalities.) If, for example, I have a gifted student who also has low vision or dyslexia, I can provide this assignment in large print or allow extended time to finish the written assignment. Should a student have an orthopedic impairment that makes writing difficult, we can use technology to allow this assignment to be completed online. I do frequently have students with ADHD. For those students, I will help them to stay on task. I may need to question them verbally or stop by their table to assess their progress. I try to change activity frequently during a lesson to help keep their attention focused on the task at hand.
