Career Exploration & Ethical Use of Information

Unit Plan
Collaboration: Amanda Sikes & Julia Smiley
Grade: 5th
ISTE Standards:

Creativity and Innovation: Students demonstrate creative thinking,

construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes
using technology.
Communication and collaboration: Students use digital media and
environments to communicate and work collaboratively, including at a
distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning
of others.
Research and information fluency: Students apply digital tools to
gather, evaluate, and use information.
Critical thinking, problem solving and decision making: Students use
critical thinking skills to plan and conduct research, manage projects,
solve problems, and make informed decisions using appropriate digital
tools and resources.
Digital Citizenship: Students understand human, cultural, and societal
issues related to technology and practice legal and ethical behavior.
Technology operations and concepts: Students demonstrate a sound
understanding of technology concepts, systems, and operations.

AASL Standards

Inquire, think critically, and gain knowledge.

Draw conclusions, make informed decisions, apply knowledge to new
situations, and create new knowledge.
Share knowledge and participate ethically and productively as
members of our democratic society.
Pursue personal and aesthetic growth.

Content Area Standards:

CM3: Use accurate, current and unbiased career information during

career planning and management.
CM3.K4 Identify several ways to classify occupations.
CM3.K2 Recognize that career information includes occupational,
education and training, employment, and economic information and
that there is a range of career information resources available.

CM3.A2 Demonstrate the ability to use different types of career

information resources (i.e., occupational, educational, economic, and
employment) to support career planning.
CM3.K3 Recognize that the quality of career information resource
content varies (e.g., accuracy, bias, and how up-to-date and complete
it is).
CM5.K3 Identify employment trends that affect your career plans.
R.CCR.1 Read closely to determine what the text says explicitly and to make
logical inferences from it; cite specific textual evidence when writing or
speaking to support conclusions drawn from the text
R.CCR.2 Determine central ideas or themes of a text and analyze their
development; summarize the key supporting details and ideas
R.CCR.4 Interpret words and phrases as they are used in a text, including
determining technical, connotative, and figurative meanings, and analyze
how specific word choices shape meaning or tone
R.CCR.6 Assess how point of view or purpose shapes the content and style of
a text
R.CCR.10 Read and comprehend complex literary and informational texts
independently and proficiently Writing
W.CCR.2 Write informative/explanatory texts to examine and convey complex
ideas and information clearly and accurately through the effective selection,
organization, and analysis of content
W.CCR.4 Produce clear and coherent writing in which the development,
organization, and style are appropriate to task, purpose, and audience
W.CCR.5 Develop and strengthen writing as needed by planning, revising,
editing, rewriting, or trying a new approach
W.CCR.8 Gather relevant information from multiple print and digital sources,
assess the credibility and accuracy of each source, and integrate the
information while avoiding plagiarism
W.CCR.9 Draw evidence from literary or informational texts to support
analysis, reflection, and research

Guiding Questions:

How does a person find information on careers?

What training or education will I need to have in order to work in the
career field of my choosing?
How do I get there from here?
What are the duties and responsibilities that go along with this
career/occupation/job?
Can you see yourself performing these duties and responsibilities every
day for the rest of your life?
What is the outlook/job availability for this career, based on where you
wish to live and work?

How much money will I make if I complete my training for this

occupation, based on where you wish to live and work?
If your career requires that you continue on to college, what major will
you need to complete in order to meet your goal?
How can I be an ethical user of information found on the Internet?
How can I determine if the resources are accurate when found on the
Internet?

Inquiry

Students will conduct research on careers using the Internet. They will
also use a Web 2.0 tool of their choice to present their final career
portfolio.
Students will understand ethical use of information and be able to
determine which websites contain accurate up-to-date information that
is relevant to their research.

Background

All fifth grade students are required to complete a career portfolio by

the end of 5th grade. The students in Mrs. Smileys 5th grade class are
struggling with completing the portfolio and she is worried because
several of them are simply copying and pasting information from the
Internet. In addition, she is concerned that the students dont
understand the difference between a career and a job since many of
them have no idea which career to research. In 5th grade, students are
required to have career presentations on four of the 17 career clusters.
Those four are Finance, Information Technology, Marketing, and
Government/Public Administration. We have guest speakers coming on
November 4, 2015 to speak to the class on each of these career
clusters for about 15 minutes each.

Mini-Lesson 1: Introduction to Careers (1-2 class periods)

Essential Questions
o How does a person find information on careers?
o How do I get there from here?
Instruction
o During the first lesson, the regular classroom teacher will
introduce careers to the students. They will begin working on
their career workbook which includes different kinds of
worksheets on each of the 4 careers that they need to focus on
for 5th grade Ga DOE requirements. The media specialist has
created a short Elementary Career Lesson Path for the students
to do http://www.lessonpaths.com/learn/i/elementarycareers/career-party-7. The first activity is a game where the
students begin to learn about what kinds of careers would be

best for their own characteristics. The second activity allows the
students to browse videos on careers and learn about the
requirements, education, and salary of each career.
Assessment
o This lesson will have a very informal ticket out the door where
each student lists their top three choices for a career research
project and one reason they chose each career.

Mini-Lesson 2: Copyright & Plagiarism (1 class period)

Essential Questions
o How can I be an ethical user of information found on the
Internet?
o How can I determine if the resources are accurate when found on
the Internet?
Instruction
o During the second lesson, the media specialist will be teaching
the students about ethical use of information and research
strategies to help with their final project. The students will start
out watching a video on how to avoid plagiarism. This video is
very student-friendly and easy to understand. They will also
watch several videos on copyright and creative commons. The
media specialist will end the instruction by giving the students a
Plagiarism Internet Scavenger Hunt where they will be required
to learn more about plagiarism and citing references.
http://edtech2.boisestate.edu/jenniferharris2/502/scavenger.html
. The media specialist will also provide each student with a link to
the curated list of plagiarism and copyright videos so that they
can view them while they are working on their final career
research project. http://www.scoop.it/t/ethical-use-ofinformation-by-amanda-sikes.
Assessment
o The students will be required to use Voki to make a short video
about plagiarism and copyright and why they are important for
the upcoming career research project for 5th graders.

Mini-Lesson 3: Career Day Speakers

Essential Questions
o What training or education will I need to have in order to work in
the career field of my choosing?
o What are the duties and responsibilities that go along with this
career/occupation/job?
o What is the outlook/job availability for this career, based on
where you wish to live and work?

o How much money will I make if I complete my training for this

occupation, based on where you wish to live and work?
o If your career requires that you continue on to college, what
major will you need to complete in order to meet your goal?
Instruction
o The media specialist, teacher, and administration has worked
together to find 4 guest speakers to come and speak to the
students for a 15 minute segment. There is one guest speaker
from each of the four categories. We have a banker coming
(Finance), a Technology Specialist/Computer Repair person
(Information Technology), a local boutique shop owner
(Marketing), and someone from our local Government (Public
Administration). Each speaker will introduce their career, talk
about the education and training required, the work
environment, salary, and future job outlook for each career. This
is designed to help the students understand the items that they
should include in their own career research presentation.
Assessment
o The students will complete a short survey at the end of career
day. They will write one thing they learned about each career.

Mini-Lesson 4: Web 2.0 Portfolio Tools

Instruction
o The GA DOE requires each 5th grade student to complete a career
portfolio on the career of his/her choice. The media specialist will
introduce a few Web 2.0 tools that would be great to help
students put their career information into a portfolio format. At
the end of the lesson, all students in the class should have a
portfolio started and be ready to start working on their project
with their regular classroom teacher. The media specialist has
prepared a curated list of online presentation tools for each
student. http://list.ly/list/kFH-online-presentation-tools. During
the instructional time, the media specialist will demonstrate how
to use each of the tools and ask each student to choose their
favorite option for a portfolio shell.
Assessment
o By the end of the period, each student will show the media
specialist the program they have chosen and describe the plans
they have for completing the project.

Extension
o Once the media specialist is finished presenting the information
to the students, they will spend 2 weeks working on their career

projects. The media specialist will be available to assist the

regular classroom teacher if needed.