A great question for your students to ponder before diving into your Career unit. The impetus for this question came from a story I heard on the Marketplace podcast:

While listening, ask your students to listen:

• What were the common themes that the reporter found most interesting when researching these 100 different jobs?
• What insight came from the McDonald’s employee in Iowa?
• What was the inspiring insight that the reporter gleaned about the importance of work in people’s lives? Do you agree with her on this point?

Here’s a good activity to develop your students’ critical thinking and reading skills:

• Go to Inside Jobs article on the The Atlantic website.
• Use this graphical organizer to complete the activity.
• Pick three jobs that interest you as potential careers and read the interviews from the article
• Answer these questions after reading each interview:
  • What factors influenced how the interviewee ended up in their career?
  • What education or skills are required to succeed at the job?
  • Does the interviewee seem to enjoy their job? Why or why not?
  • What surprised you the most as you read through the interview?
  • Are you more or less interested in the role? Why?
• Pick two jobs that you are curious about and complete the graphical organizer on page 2.

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Check out this interactive from our Interactive Library: How Is the Way We Work Changing?

About the Author

Tim Ranzetta

Tim's saving habits started at seven when a neighbor with a broken hip gave him a dog walking job. Her recovery, which took almost a year, resulted in Tim getting to know the bank tellers quite well (and accumulating a savings account balance of over $300!). His recent entrepreneurial adventures have included driving a shredding truck, analyzing executive compensation packages for Fortune 500 companies and helping families make better college financing decisions. After volunteering in 2010 to create and teach a personal finance program at Eastside College Prep in East Palo Alto, Tim saw firsthand the impact of an engaging and activity-based curriculum, which inspired him to start a new non-profit, Next Gen Personal Finance.

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