Career Note for Kids: One news article with 18 jobs mentioned!
Yesterday’s Wall Street Journal had an interesting article about the dry cleaning industry, with the latest news about how the economy, environmental concerns and changing consumer habits are affecting it.
But what really grabbed my attention was the number of jobs referred to in the article. I counted eighteen. There are probably many more considering that the article reports 24,124 dry cleaning and non-coin-operated laundry establishments in the U.S. alone.
Here are the ones I noted:
- Dry Cleaning Store Chain Operator
- Dry Cleaning Store Manager
- Pressing Machine Operator
- Garment Sorter
- Seamstress/Tailors
- Forensic Accountant & Business Advisor
- Market Researcher
- Consumer Products Maker
- Consumer Products Company Spokesperson
- Valet
- Store/Facilities Designer
- Store Design Tester
- Environment Protection Agency Representative
- Director of Technical Services – National Dry Cleaners Association
- Chief Executive Officer - Dry cleaning & Laundry Institute
- Director of Public Affairs - Consumer Federation of America
- Professor of Fiber Science
- Dry Cleaning Machine Operators
What a creative way to learn about different jobs in various industries. You should try it as you read the newspaper, a book or online articles. Your knowledge of the working world will impress everybody!
Learn how to get careerwise on an everyday basis and have fun with career exploration by visiting www.GetCareerWise.com.
Just words? Or 15 important topics for kids’ career & life skills development?
Do you think career exploration is a topic solely for the classroom or guidance counselor’s office? Or that you couldn’t lead a valuable discussion about the employment world without help from a teacher?
I hope not!
Because you can help prepare and excite kids about joining the workforce, equipped with relevant and universal skills, using your own career wisdom and hands-on life experiences.
For example, you know how important the following values and attributes are. It’s never too early to start helping your kids understand them too. They are the building blocks for success in any professional or life pursuit.
Have fun discussing each word, concept and value. Give examples, tell stories, relate them to people you know or experiences you’ve had. Ask other people what these words mean to them.
Think about people in the news and characters in literature or film who represent the good, the bad or the interesting. Be creative!
Add to the list. What else is important for success and personal fulfillment in the work-a-day world? Share your additions with us. We’ll keep the list growing and give you the credit!
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integrity
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responsibility
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collaboration
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accountability
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creativity
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punctuality
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flexibility
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team spirit
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vision
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patience
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honesty
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pride
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humor
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humility
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perseverance
Our award-winning CareerWise Grow Up. Get a Job. Career Exploration workbook is filled with other stimulating kids-to-careers activities and exercises that can be used by families, for home schooling, in classrooms and in After School Programs. It comes with a Free Teaching Guide. It is also an ideal give-away for corporations participating in workforce development programs.
10 ways grandparents can help motivate their grandkids in school & life
There have been some wonderful stories going around lately about just how hip and active today’s grandparents are.
Youthful, energetic and ready to try new things, they also frequently have more time to spend with their grandkids than working parents do.
Also, many grandparents today are very tech savvy. They know their way around Facebook, Skype, texting, tweets, emails, YouTube and all the other ways kids like to stay in touch.
So even if grandparents and their grandkids are scattered geographically, they can build strong bonds. Communications can be fun and very, very valuable. Especially if grandparents want to help their kids develop important life and career skills.
One story in the Wall Street Journal recently relayed how grandparents on an extended cruise in Europe sent their granddaughter two emails per day. One was a personal message and one was to share with her classmates in geography class. The classroom email contained either information about the latest port of call, a geography quiz, photographs, or something else instructional and interesting. The teacher put up a map and the class had a great time tracking the cruise and learning about new parts of the world. Isn’t that a great idea?
Grandparents can add a career awareness component to their communications as well. The more often kids are shown a connection between their school subjects and real world opportunities, the more motivation they will have to study hard and graduate with marketable skills.
Cruising grandparents could also share information about who helped them plan their cruise and the transportation, healthcare, hospitality, entertainment and other professionals they’ve met along the way. You get the idea.
Here are some other ways grandparents can become career mentors:
- Share photos you take of people working at jobs you think are interesting, exciting, important, or uncommon.
- Share news articles, profiles and interviews with interesting professionals and share why you found them of interest.
- Offer to visit your grandchild’s school during or outside of career week activities to offer help, advice and mentoring about your areas of expertise. Or to give hard-working kids a pat on the back and individual encouragement.
- Take your grandchild ‘behind the scenes’ at a business around town. See a fish market in the early morning, watch lifeguards set up their towers and emergency vehicles, visit a farm or ranch where local produce grows; visit the local zoo, aquarium or opera house for a backstage tour.
- If you live far apart and aren’t tech savvy, send postcards from your community. In addition to ‘wish you were here,’ add a note about the civic leaders, architects, city planners, educators, entertainers or business people in the area who make it such a fun, safe or interesting place to live.
- When your grandkids come to visit, sprinkle your conversations with fun and motivating observations about the work-a-day world. Help counteract negativity about the employment stats that are making headlines. You know things will change dramatically by the time your youngsters are ready to enter the employment world. And there are still millions of people out there working at jobs they love!
- If your grandchild has a particular love – soccer, ice cream, movies, dogs, etc – make a point of talking about all the professionals connected to that product, service or business. Make it fun and interesting. Do research together. Make it like a treasure hunt.
- Biographies and autobiographies are a wonderful way to introduce kids to people with interesting careers and/or career paths. If you have favorites, share them. If you volunteer now, tell them why you find it rewarding and how your career path led you to want to keep contributing.
- Find creative ways to link what is going on in your life with career choices: ‘ The nurse in my doctor’s office told me she specialized in Geriatric Nursing and just loves it’. Or “We sat with the captain of the cruise ship. He’s had a fascinating life.’ or “I have a new golf club that makes a big difference in my swing. I wonder who designed it?”
- Career-related gifts have long-term value and can be shared in the classroom. Pick one that promotes important dialogues. Listen carefully to your grandkid’s dream about their future. Use what you hear to motivate them in school so they understand what it will take to make their dreams come true.
Remember, nurturing and mentoring kids so they develop important career and life skills can be done by all of us. It is very rewardng to help them become careerwise!
For creative career exploration resources, including a fascinating poster with 1001 Job Titles visit www.GetCareerWise.com. Or download ’ Sophie & Her Fairy Godmentor, a tale of career exploration & self-discovery’ on your Kindle. It provides a great perpective on thinking big about the future!
10 Easy Ways to Help Prepare Kids for Joining the Workforce
Lively, valuable conversations that will help kids in everything they do in life can take place around the dinner table or bbq, around a campfire, on a roadtrip or even while hiking and biking. Jobs and ‘hire education’ are hot topics right now –make them fun, engaging and relevant for your kids this summer!
Here are some tips for how to get started:
1) Share with them what you like about your job or responsibilities-not just the financial rewards but the satisfaction you get from different aspects of it. Discuss your career dreams and how you did (or did not) pursue them. Be honest about the things you like about your job, your goals for the future and how you plan to attain those goals.
2) Take notice of your kids’ innate talents and interests; comment and encourage their development. Explain how specific strengths relate to specific jobs. Look for attributes such as leadership and negotiation skills, detail orientation, mediation and conflict resolution skills or analytical and problem solving abilities. Praise these talents and help your child investigate careers that would utilize them.
3) When you assign responsibilities around the house, draw parallels between how your child executes them and how that skill could be valued in the workplace. For example, if your son or daughter never forgets to take out the trash, praise her reliability, punctuality and teamwork. If your son never forgets to feed the dog, applaud his maturity, sense of responsibility, compassion and nurturing.
4) Instigate lively discussions with friends and family about the jobs they’ve had in their lives, their dreams, aspirations, successes and challenges. Encourage kids’ curiosity about what people do for a living and how they ended up in the job they have. Talk about the educational or vocational training that was required.
5)Recognize and reward behaviors that will develop into strong, marketable skills such as honesty, accountability, accuracy, punctuality and teamwork. They not only develop a child’s character, they prepare them for becoming a respected employee or employer.
6)Engage kids in lively discussions about their futures; ask questions about what they like to do most at school, after school or with friends. Help them connect-the-dots between their interests and jobs that would incorporate those interests. Spend time together exploring options. Go on field trips, to the library, to neighborhood career fairs and corporate open houses. Visit college campuses and vocational training centers and ask questions about what people do for a living, what skills they needed to develop, who will hire them and what they will do on the job every day.
7) Add a new dimension to vacations and family outings by discussing the people behind the activities, events and exhibits you enjoy. Talk about who keeps our national parks safe and beautiful; who keeps the ocean and marine life healthy and vital; what professionals coordinate a museum or art exhibit. Delve into the backgrounds of the people who keep our world working smoothly and safely and who innovate new and better ideas that continually improve our standard of living.
Help your kids develop an appreciation and awareness of all the professionals who affect their lives on a daily basis, from the people who build our roads to the waste management employees who collect and recycle waste to the farmer, food distributors and grocers who get food to the market shelves. Explore behind-the-scenes teamwork and all the jobs and talents involved.
9) Help your kids develop strong interpersonal communication skills. Don’t let them focus only on computer, phone or text messaging skills. Help them learn how to verbalize their ideas and rationales concisely and to present them to others. The fear of speaking in public is one of the most common afflictions shared by adults. Help your child grow up at ease and confident in front of others. It will be a huge boost to their education, career and social success.
10) Help your kids develop a good work ethic by setting a good example. Do what you say you’re going to do, live up to your responsibilities, be a team player and give 100% on the job–especially the job of preparing your kids for the future.
Ten ways to help kids develop strong work & life skills at home
1. Hold them accountable. If they promise they are going to feed the cat at five, make sure they feed the cat at five. Don’t do it for them.
2. Make them responsible. If they are old enough to do homework, they are old enough to have that homework packed up and ready to take to school in the morning.
3. Don’t wait on them. You know very well there is a difference between taking care of your kids and catering to their every whim. You’re not doing them any favors with the latter.
4. Help them develop a strong work ethic. Have fun while demonstrating the satisfaction of a job well done. “Look how clean the car is. We made it shine!”
5. Show them how you get over a disappointment. Hopefully it’s with honesty, maturity and grace. Let them know that just because something doesn’t go your way, you won’t give in to defeat, retribution or negativity.
6. It’s a cliché and a bumper sticker for good reason: Practice Random Acts of Kindness. Let your kids see that treating others with dignity, respect and generosity makes them a better person and the world a better place.
7. Point out the skills it takes for them to do things well: “You made your bed, hung up your clothes and took out the trash already? You are very organized and efficient this morning!”
8. Encourage team spirit and collaboration. Dispelling the ‘all about me’ attitude is going to help them in their personal and professional relationships.
9. Encourage their passions and curiosity. “You seemed fascinated by what the vet did today for Tinkerbelle. I read that the zoo offers behind-the-scenes tours of their veterinary facility, would you like to go on Saturday?”
10. Help connect-the-dots between their schoolwork and skills they use in every day life: “Thank you for counting my change for me. You must be doing really well in arithmetic. What else are you learning?”
11. (Ok, there are more than ten tips on this list. But for a reason.) #11 is: Encourage your kids to do more than the minimum of anything. Show them how fulfilling it is to try harder, give more, and go above and beyond. You won’t be pushing them to over-achieve, but rather to realize just how capable they are.
For creative, fun, easy-to-use career exploration materials, like our fascinating poster with 1001 Job Titles from A to Z, visit www.GetCareerWise.com.
