CareerOnestop: Personal Exploration

Objective: By the end of this lesson, adult learners will be able to:

• Understand the purpose and importance of career self-assessments.
• Complete interest, skills, and work values assessments on CareerOneStop.
• Analyze the results to identify potential career paths.

In pairs or small groups, ask learners to think about their current or past job roles and share what they enjoyed or disliked most about them.

Facilitate a brief group discussion where learners share key takeaways.

Explanation: Introduce the concept of career exploration and self-assessments.

Discuss why understanding one's interests, skills, and work values is crucial for career satisfaction.
Highlight how these assessments can reveal potential career matches they may not have considered before.

As pairs/small groups, discuss: "What do you think defines a ‘good fit’ for a career?"

Gather answers on the whiteboard to engage learners in a collaborative brainstorm.

Demonstration: Guide learners through CareerOneStop Self-Assessments. Explain how to access the three main assessments:

1. Interest Assessment: Measures preferences and aligns them with potential careers
2. Skills Assessment: Identifies skills and matches them with relevant careers.
3. Work Values Assessment: Helps to clarify values and their importance in a work setting.

Walkthrough: Show an example of each assessment, emphasizing how to interpret results.

Discuss the benefits of each assessment in pairs/small groups. Share ideas with the total class. Write ideas on the whiteboard.

Activity: Self-Assessment Completion

In pairs, learners do the Interest Assessment together. Discuss the career matches offered at the end of the assessment. Are they a good match?

Part 2

1. Individually learners complete the Interest, Skills, and Work Values assessments(listed at the side) on CareerOneStop. Students do not need an account to use CareerOneStop.If students create an account, they can save their information.
2. Instruct learners to take notes on careers that interest them from the assessment results.
3. Provide assistance and answer any questions learners may have during the assessments.

Results Analysis and Reflection

1. Pair learners up to discuss their findings. Encourage them to reflect on:
   1. Did the results align with what they expected?
   2. Were there any surprising matches?
2. Lead a group discussion on common themes or surprising trends found in their results.
   Question Prompts:
   1. "What careers stood out to you and why?"
   2. "Which skills or values were highlighted as important for you?"
3. Learners fill out the Personal Career Exploration Worksheet (available under documents)

Career Research Workshop

• Using the career suggestions from the assessments, learners choose one or two careers to research further on CareerOneStop or other reliable sites.
• Encourage learners to look at job descriptions, required skills, typical salaries, and growth outlooks.

Homework/Take-Home Task:

Ask learners to create a short plan outlining steps to further explore their top career options (e.g., informational interviews, additional skills training, or related volunteer work).