This week on Homeschool Highschool Podcast: Career Exploration for Teens Who Don’t Have a Clue- Special Replay.

Career Exploration for Teens Who Don’t Have a Clue

“SO, what are you going to do after graduation?”

That’s the dreaded question for many teens. They simply don’t have a clue what they want to do.

How do you help a teen find direction in life? How do you help them get to know themselves or get to know God’s leading?

For teens who know they do not want to go to college but do not have a clue what they want to do

Many teens do not have any idea what they want to do after graduation. That is okay. They do not need to know everything about the future during high school. However, it is wise to help them explore. Here are some ideas:

Give them rich experiences
- Many times teens do not know what they want to do because they have not experienced it yet. One kind of rich experience is field trips. Hey, the good thing about homeschooling is that we homeschool moms tend to value field trips (although sometimes at high school level, it is harder to squeeze them in to our teens’ busy schedules).
- However, if you create a Career Exploration elective credit for their transcript, you can log many field trips towards that credit. That is because, any trip gives a little more life experience. Any life experience helps build the ability to make decisions- especially career decisions.
- For instance: ranger-led nature walks at state parks, cooking demonstrations at special events, car shows or museum exhibits. Sometimes, a teen will get inspired by a watching the person in charge of whatever event they are experiencing. They think: “Hmmm, this might be a cool job!” Or, on the other hand, they might think, “Ugh, I would NEVER want to do that!” Either way is valuable career exploration.
Show them role models
- Movies based on careers
- Biographies of interesting jobs
- FB Watches or YouTubes about interesting jobs
Volunteer work
- Teens need to do volunteer work. It is good for transcript and the soul. Service work is SO important for personal knowledge and development, as well as making the world a better place.
- Some volunteer opportunities our teens have done:
  - Church (worship, set up, digital team, nursery, office)
  - Digital volunteer opportunities
  - Food bank
  - State park volunteer events
  - Library volunteers

For teens, whether they have a clue about career or not, try a career exploration course

A good career exploration course is very helpful. For non-college-bound teens, 7SistersHomeschool has a simple Career Exploration Textbook. Even if you choose something else, think about looking for curriculum that includes (like our workbook):

What is God’s will?
- Teens who are believers sometimes feel anxious about choosing a career that will please God. A good curriculum helps them trust God to direct their paths.
Past experiences
- What have teens already done that help them find strengths or interests
What other people see in them
- Get some feedback from people who know them
Can they identify interests?
- IF the power went out for the day, what would you do for fun? If you had a day to yourself with no chores or schoolwork, what would you do?
Define career values
- Career values help teens choose a career field by defining what is important to them: Work hours, desire for involvement in things after work, level of income desired, etc. (Rabbit trail, all teens will benefit from taking a Financial Literacy course that helps them understand and plan for financial responsibilities coming their way in adulthood.)

Explore careers

Check out career descriptions and information at CareerOneStop.org.

Join a club or interest group

Sometimes a group experience will help them explore an interest or strength, network or lead to the next interesting experience. Even if it does not turn out to be fun, no experience is wasted. All experiences are growth, one way or the other.

Try some apprenticeships

We cannot recommend this enough. See if you can help your teen find something that can count as apprenticeship.

Be sure to log everything!

Those Career Exploration electives are SO valuable and look great on the transcript!

For more on this topic

Check out this interview with our friend, Angela O’Shaughnessy about her non-college-bound sons’ career exploration experiences:
- Helping Non-college-bound Teens Find Success
- Why Trade School?
AND check out Susan Stewarts suggestions of Careers that Don’t Require College.
If you are just starting out, here is information on how to get teens interested in career exploration.

Join Vicki for a quick discussion to help non-college-bound teens get their career exploration underway!

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Sabrina, Vicki, and Kym have been mentoring, coaching, and teaching homeschool high schoolers about Career Exploration for decades.

Join them for an expert discussion on helping teens who don’t have a clue.

Resources:

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