Grades 6-8 Activities
Activities for Kindergarten through Fifth Grade
Activities for Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade
Activities for Ninth Grade through Twelfth Grade

Before In-Demand Jobs Week

Online Scavenger Hunt

Take your students to the OhioMeansJobs website and look for answers to the questions in the Scavenger Hunt Question Guide. Students will need OhioMeansJobs Backpacks to answer some of these questions. Follow the website prompts to start a backpack, or use the Guided Tour to start a backpack.

Unusual Occupations!

Have students examine unusual occupations by playing online games!

Making a Career Choice

Convey to your students that choosing a career is an important decision we all get to make for ourselves. It's best to think about your adult career starting now, so you can choose courses in high school that help you achieve your goals. One strategy in career planning is to identify a career cluster — a group of jobs that call for related interests and skills. Instead of focusing on one specific job, focus on a cluster of jobs that use your interests and skills.

Use this activity to help students explore career clusters they are interested in and possible courses they could take in high school based on their career interests.

SS Grade 6, Content Statement 13
SS Grade 6, Content Statement 15

During In-Demand Jobs Week

Create a Middle School virtual Career Immersion Day

Work with local businesses to coordinate a virtual career immersion day with engaging, hands-on activities for middle schoolers, including virtual tours of local companies.

Scheduling virtual Classroom Speakers

Invite business and community partners to virtually meet with students about their career fields and industries. Work with an area business advisory council or chamber of commerce to organize speakers. This map may help connect you to partners.

After In-Demand Jobs Week

Graphing Prices

Help students learn how to graph changes in the prices goods in a real-world graphing exercise using this resource from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

SS Grade 6, Content Statement 16

Growing Your Community Activity

Have students identify their career goals and where these careers exist in the community. (Consider using OhioMeansJobs K-12 Backpacks or any career exploration software to expose students to all of their options.) Have students write about their career goals. Then, ask students to use the internet to research the 20 fastest-growing occupations in Ohio – including their job requirements and the educational backgrounds graduates need for these occupations. After students report their findings, have a classroom discussion about how many of the occupations exist in the local community. Then, have students refer to their personal career goals and investigate whether their chosen occupations exist in your community.

Here are a few discussion questions to consider asking your students:

  • How has technology shaped these occupations?
  • How might these occupations change in the future as technology advances?
  • If some occupations aren’t represented in your community, do you think they might be in the future? Why or why not?
  • As a follow-up activity, have students research the top careers from 20 years ago and contrast the differences between then and now.
SS Grade 7, Content Statement 19
SS Grade 7, Content Statement 20
SS Grade 8, Content Statement 24
SS Grade 8, Content Statement 25
 

Work with your Career-Technical Planning District lead to connect students to its career-technical education program and industry-recognized credentials options in your area.

Last Modified: 4/25/2022 9:42:10 AM