Employability Skills Name: Amy Christian Title: Employable? Maybe, Hopefully, Sometime!

Summary: This lesson is intended to reinforce the importance of employability skills in achieving workplace success. Students will begin to understand and develop their own understanding of values, skills, and attitudes and how these relate to successful employment. Primary Core Goals/Outcomes: Demonstrate leadership skills, integrity, ethical behavior, and social responsibility while collaborating to achieve common goals. - Adapt to varied roles, responsibilities, and expectations. - Work effectively in a climate of ambiguity and changing priorities. - Demonstrate appropriate risk-taking. Intended Learning Outcomes: -Students will identify and understand the skills and attitudes essential for successful learning, life, and work. -Students will demonstrate effective communication when talking and listening to others within differing contexts. -Students will be able to apply a developing understanding of ethics and social responsibility when faced with varied moral dilemmas. -Students will begin to develop an understanding of personal values such as honesty, respect, and compassion and how these values apply to employment. Pedagogical Decisions: 1) More students centered - The best way for students to learn and understand employability skills is by personally experiencing scenarios or situations in which they are in control and tasked to use critical thinking skills in order to reach conclusions. The activities in this lesson are purposely student centered so that students become responsible for their own learning and begin to internalize the concepts. When it comes to the employability skills discussed in this lesson, there are no correct answers, and students have the opportunity to develop their own ideas and understanding of what it means to be employable, as well as develop their own personal set of values. 2) Alternate type of learning - The students are really put in charge of their own learning in this lesson. Students are allowed and encouraged to explore the many possible solutions, while using their critical thinking skills and creativity. The teacher may set the learning in motion, but it is the student driving the learning experiences. 3) Middle prior experiences - The students should have a basic understanding of many of the concepts in this lesson prior to instruction although they may not be fully developed. Students are asked to consider their own prior experiences and knowledge while working through the activities and lessons. While the lessons are not designed to have a lot of teacher direct instruction, some concepts may need more explanation than others. 4) Deep knowledge - This lesson really aims for students to construct a deeper knowledge. The goal of this lesson is less about superficial knowledge and more about helping develop long-lasting, critical thinking skills as well as foster development of their own individual understanding of values. 5) Shorter to middle duration - Employability skills, a positive attitude, and ability to work well with others are extremely important skills that employers are looking for in their employees. The importance of this topic for the future success of students is great; therefore, a somewhat longer duration would allow for more time and opportunities for students to fully understand and digest the learning. Unfortunately, time is often limited therefore, many of these lessons can also be intertwined with other lessons and across subject areas. One week would probably be sufficient to complete this lesson.

6) Less structured - The goal is for students to achieve the skills they need to be successful beyond school once they enter the world of work. Many jobs require employees that are not only able to work together as a team, but also be self-starters and critical thinkers. Providing learning opportunities that are less structured more closely mirrors the real workplace. Therefore, students will hopefully become more and better prepared as they become comfortable and successful in less structured environments. This also allows for students to take more ownership of their learning experiences. That is not to say there is no structure. As in the workplace, some structure is often needed, especially at the beginning of new tasks or jobs. 7) Individual, Small, & Whole group - Most of the activities are done in small or large groups. This does not, however, take away from the importance of the individuals responsibility. The concept of individual responsibility is not lost amongst the ideals of teamwork. These lessons encourage individual growth for the sake of self as well as the sake of the whole team. In effort to reinforce individual understanding, there are ample opportunities for self-reflection throughout the lesson. 8) Some additional resources required - Students really drive where this lesson goes. Therefore, additional resources are often required and vary dependent upon the class and individual students. A variety of web resources, books, and relevant employment based scenarios are great to have readily available. Activity Types: - View presentations to gain information. Possible technologies: PowerPoint, Prezi, Haiku Deck, Inspiration - Group Discussions to engage in dialog with peers. Possible technologies: LMS, class Wikispaces, Voicethread - Research and take notes to gather, analyze, and synthesize information. Possible technologies: internet, digital archives, Evernote, Inspiration - Conduct interviews with business community members. Possible technologies: Skype, Google Hangout, telephone, email - Complete charts or tables. Possible technologies: Word, Google Doc, Inspiration - Answer questions, take tests or quizzes to check for understanding. Possible technologies: iClickers, LMS, Google Form - Write an essay or short report. Possible technologies: Google Doc, Word - Create and do a presentation to share understanding with others. Possible technologies: Google Presentation, PowerPoint, Storyboard - Create a video, audio, or other performance to share understanding with others. Possible technologies: iMovie, Audacity, Photostory Assessment Plan: For project assignments, students will be assessed using a project assignment rubric (summative). A variety of formative assessments will be used throughout the lesson such as a short quiz, verbal checks for understanding through class discussions, and daily reflection journals. At the completion of some group projects, peer review assessments may be used. Materials: Used by the Teacher: Assignment rubrics, student handouts, computer, projector. Used by the Students: Paper, pencils, student handouts, assignment rubrics. Technologies: Used by the Teacher: Computer or laptop, projector, speakers, school LMS, Internet, iClickers, presentation software, screen capture program, Podcast creation tool, Youtube, internet resources, Google Docs & Presentation. Used by the Students: Computer or laptop, school LMS, Internet, iClickers, word processor, internet resources, Google Docs & Presentation, video recorder, headset with mic, video and/or audio creation tools, other Web 2.0 tools as chosen by students.

Instructional Procedures: Length of Lesson: Approximately two weeks - this is the beginning of a series of lessons for Professional & Personal Development. Students are enrolled in the 12th grade Career Work Experience at Hayfield Community College. Ongoing - Throughout the school year, students will complete a series of lessons focused on employability while completing an internship. Day 1 Anticipatory Set: The teacher shares a personal experience or other story with the class. It works best if it is of a personal nature (life story, education, first job). After the short story, a test the students listening skills is conducted by having them complete a short quiz using the classroom iClickers. Spend a few moments talking about listening skills. Direct Instruction: The teacher shares a short presentation (Haiku Deck) on listening skills and the importance of this skill in the workplace. The next activity is then introduced. Students are given a handout containing questions for the speaker to answer and questions for the listener to answer. Group Work: In pairs or small groups, students practice their listening skills. Each pair or group designates a speaker for each round. The teacher gives the groups a topic and the the speakers have 3 minutes to talk about it. When time is up, the listeners have two minutes to ask the speaker questions. When time is up, both the speaker and the listener answer the questions pertaining to their specific role. This continues until everyone has had the opportunity to be both speaker and listener. The entire group comes back together and discusses their experiences. What are the different levels of listening? Is listening and hearing the same thing? How can you tell if someone is truly listening? Eye contact? Body language? What strategies can be applied to listen more effectively? Extension Activity: Students access and listen to various podcasts and then answer short questionnaires to assess their listening skills. Daily Activity: During the duration of this lesson, students will complete a reflective journal about what they learned during that days class. The journals are completed within the LMS and shared only with the teacher. Day 2 Anticipatory Set: Students will complete a How Ethical Are You? quiz using the classroom student response system (iClickers). Individual & Group Activity: Using something like Think-Pair-Share, have students brainstorm what they think is meant by employability skills and what do employers want in their employees. Using the discussion feature in the LMS, students will post what they feel are the top ten employability skills and then respond to at least two other class members. Individual Activity: Students research employability skills. In a Google Presentation shared by the teacher, each student completes one slide by adding information he/she located on employability skills. Once the activity is complete, the presentation is viewed by the class. This presentation will be used in future lessons throughout the term. Daily Activity: Reflective journal entry. Day 3 - 4 Check for Understanding: Students are asked to write down one thing either that they have learned or something they still have questions about. All the sheets are then read by the teacher and addressed as needed, prior to moving on. A discussion thread is started in the LMS for students to pose questions and/or thoughts

throughout the lesson. Direct Instruction/Individual Activity: The teacher reviews the employability skills identified by the class. The teacher then shares that according to much research, job applicants often are unaware of the essential skills required to be a successful employee. Students are then asked to view a Voicethread presentation containing four short examples of what job applicants think employers want versus what employers really want. Students must comment on at least two of the four examples. Individual Activity: Students complete a short employability skills assessment for themselves. Once they have completed the assessment, they score their results using the supplied scoring sheet provided. In a Google Doc, students summarize their results listing both their strengths and weaknesses. Small Group Activity: In pairs, students role play going to a job interview. Using their employability skills summary, they must highlight their strengths, but also point out their weaknesses and then suggest ways in that they can improve. The interviews are recorded for students to refer back to later. Peer assessments are completed at the end of the activity. Extension Activity: Reflective Journal Entry Days 5 - 9 Anticipatory Set: Students are presented an ethical dilemma scenario to think about. A short discussion is held on how students feel they might handle the situation. Direct Instruction & Group Discussion: Pose the question, What is social responsibility and ethical behavior in the workplace? Have students share their ideas with students around them and then share as a whole group. A student volunteer makes a list on the Smartboard. The teacher shares a short presentation on ethics and social responsibility in the workplace. Individual Activity: Each student will interview a business person regarding employability skills, in particular, ethics and social responsibility. A short report will be completed by the student. It is the students responsibility to contact a member of the business community, set up a meeting, and conduct the meeting. The meetings can be in person, via telephone, via Skype or Google Hangout, whatever works best for the student and interviewee. A list of prompts for possible questions/topics is provided by the teacher. Group Activity/Culminating Activity: In groups of no more than four, students search for case studies (i.e. Enron, BP) concerning businesses and ethics and/or social responsibility. After choosing one case study, each group evaluates how the companys practices affected employees and how it affected the general public and economy as a whole. Each group will then develop their own example of a company involving ethical behavior and social responsibility. Each group will then create a podcast or video about the company. This could be done as a role play, news interview, whatever the students create. Once all of the projects are complete, each group will share with the class. Extensions: 1) Students can conduct job shadowing at various employers to get a better idea first-hand what skills are needed to be successful in the workplace. 2) Mock interviews can be held using volunteers from local businesses to conduct the interviews. 3) Students can complete research on several major companies and compare/contrast their Code of Conduct policies. Students can then create their own Code of Conduct (can be done individually or in small groups).