Careers Trivia

Sometimes when I'm at school or just driving somewhere, an activity idea will pop into my head, but I won't write it down right away and of course, even though, I think it'll still be there, it never is. Doing this blog is a good way for me to be self-motivated about writing things like that down, so that I could post them on here daily and keep a record of things I would actually do in the classroom.

Today I was thinking about the Pre-College workshops I have been involved in over the last year. I have been teaching middle and high school students about careers, learning styles, study skills, etc. I haven't done one since January, however, but am thinking of doing one in April or May and it'll most likely be about career exploration. I thought about the structure of the career workshops I did last year, and how not all the kids were engaged. Even though most of them enjoyed exploring careers on websites like, O-net and figuring out where their interests lie by taking the Interest Profiler, there were a few here and there that weren't as motivated. Not sure if the idea I have will work for all, but I like starting with a fun activity that connects to prior knowledge and also peeks kids' interest levels by introducing some neat concepts and ideas. So i'm thinking of putting together a trivia-like game to start the workshop with, or it could also be a good intro for a counseling unit on career exploration.

It could be done simply as a Jeopardy game or I was actually wanting to adapt the Quizmaster Trivia format, which has six categories with 5 questions in each and also uses a visual component by including photos, fuzzy pictures, maps and the like to provide a variety to the clues. There are so many professions out there that the students have never heard of (and that i have never heard of), and I think it would be fun to make it into a trivia game/guessing game by using clues that kids will be confident about, such as, "What level of education is required to become a medical doctor?" and things they might have to pick the best educated answer for from a multiple choice listing, such as "What does a Millwright do?" So I could start a workshop with a quick trivia to get students thinking about professions, education levels, skills, types of interests and strengths one has to have to engage in them, and all other related information that is available on sites like O-net. Could be fun!
For instance, do you know what an Aquacultural Manager does, or that it is one of the "bright outlook" professions students could benefit from knowing about when thinking about their futures?

Millwrights