16 Activities on Career Exploration for High School Students

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By high school, students have probably heard “What do you want to be when you grow up?” more than a few times. But whether they have an answer is a different story!

Students’ understanding of potential career paths can drastically affect their decisions. It’s one of the reasons why high school (and increasingly middle school!) is a prime time for educators to teach students about professional pathways after graduation.

Use these meaningful career exploration activities for high school students to help students discover their interests, skills, and passions. With creative research prompts and final projects, teens can shift toward fulfilling and successful careers and occupations.

Self-Reflection Activities and Career Preparation

Help high schoolers understand what they like before they explore potential career paths. Self-reflection activities inspire students to reflect on their academic passions, values, personal strengths and weaknesses, and lifestyle goals. They’re also an easy way to start units on career exploration for high school students. 

Easy self-reflection activities include:

• Personality assessments
• Personal interest writing prompts
• About me posters or booklets
• Skills assessments
• Interest surveys
• Partner interest interviews
• Resume and cover letter writing

Reflect on soft skills for future careers

Soft skills are those interpersonal skills that high schoolers use every day — and that employers want to see in their future employees. Have high schoolers reflect on their understanding of soft skills with thought-provoking activities.

Career Readiness: Soft Skill Reflection Task Cards
By The Career Ready Teacher
Grades: 7th-12th

Are your high schoolers punctual, courteous, and professional? If not, this soft skill reflection task card activity is a good place for your career exploration unit to start. A PowerPoint presentation guides students through the 30 soft skills that they should develop in their education to become valuable employees in the future.

Assess personality traits and interests

High schoolers are quick to tell you what they like, but they have a harder time applying those interests to future career plans. Help them narrow down what they’d like to do with surveys and assessments designed to analyze personality traits and interests.

Career Scenarios | Personality Traits and Interest Assessment
By The Transition Teacher
Grades: 9th-12th

Wouldn’t it be nice if a career matchmaker could match students with their future jobs? In this activity, it’s possible! High schoolers add personality traits and details into the career matchmaker activity to find out what careers would be best suited to them.

Career Exploration Worksheets with Career Interest Survey & Personality Test
By Jenn Liu — Engaging to Empower
Grades: 8th-12th
Standards: CCSS RI.9-10.10, CCRA.R.7, R.10

Students combine what they love, what the world needs, what they’re good at, and what they can be paid for with a thorough career exploration activity. Using the RIASEC Test and Myers-Briggs Personality Assessment, this resource guides high schoolers through ideal career fields based on their personality traits and professional goals.

Career Interest Symbol Supported Student Survey
By Adulting Made Easy aka SpedAdulting
Grades: 6th-12th

Ideal for special education as well as mainstream classes, this career selection activity helps students align their interests with available careers and professions. It comes with a multiple-choice interest inventory, a parent survey, and large visuals for students who learn best with a limited field of answer choices.

Create career preparation materials

Career exploration for high school students can focus on preparation materials for future interviews and careers. Look for resources that cover everything from building portfolios to writing resumes and cover letters, so students have everything they need to take those vital first steps.

Senior Portfolio: Templates for Autobiography Resume Cover Letter and More!
By Love Learning STEM
Grades: 11th-12th

Perfect as a senior project or introduction to a career exploration unit, this portfolio resource prepares students for what they’ll need to transition from high school. It includes templates for letter of recommendation requests, applications for the FAFSA and for individual colleges, autobiographies, and more.

Resume and Cover Letter Writing for College & Career Readiness
By Tracee Orman
Grades: 11th-12th
Standards: CCSS W.11-12.1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, L.11-12.1, 2, 3, 4; CCRA.W.1, 2, 4, 10; CCRA.L.1, 2, 3

Aligned to Common Core State Standards and designed to prepare students for professional requirements, this resume and cover letter writing assignment is a great addition to your career exploration unit. Editable Google Drive templates and rubrics allow you to scaffold and customize the project for particular students’ needs.

Explore career clusters and professional fields

Let students know what types of careers are out there with career cluster resources. Whether it’s a printed activity for independent work or a team activity game, these middle and high school career exploration ideas are great ways to get your project started.

Career Cluster Survey – 5 Activities for Career Exploration – Print and Digital
By School Counseling Essentials
Grades: 4th-12th

Do your students prefer painting or drawing, or do they like preparing reports? Help members of your class channel their interests and preferred learning styles into future careers with reflection questions, bell ringers, and an interview assignment in a career cluster resource.

Career Exploration Activity Game – Middle and High School Occupations
By Informed Decisions
Grades: 6th-12th
Standards: CCSS SL.6.1, 1c, 1d, 2, 3, 4, 6; SL.7.1, 1c, 1d, 2, 3, 4, 6; SL.9-10.1, 1c, 1d, 2, 3, 4, 6; SL.11-12.2, 3, 6.3, 4b, 4c, 5, 6; CCRA.W.2, 4, 6, 7, 9 SL.1, 3, 4, 5, 6; L.1, 3, 4, 5, 6

Sometimes, the best way to make a choice is to eliminate what you don’t want! Use a career elimination assignment to narrow down the careers that actually interest your high school students. With facilitation tips, an educator guide, and a reflection sheet, this resource combines social-emotional traits with desired career exploration goals.

Career Exploration Workshop Materials for High School Students

Once students know what they like to do, start exploring specific careers or occupations in more depth. Career research projects let students investigate potential opportunities and learn more about job responsibilities, required qualifications, salary expectations, positives and negatives, and growth opportunities.

These online resources can help students find all of this information:

Assign a career research project for in-depth investigation

Help high schoolers learn everything they can about potential professions and career fields with long-term research projects. Use them as final senior projects or get career-minded underclassmen started early.

Career Exploration Middle School College and Career Readiness Activities
By College Counselor Studio
Grades: 9th-12th

A low-prep research project inspires high schoolers to examine the requirements for future occupations and brainstorm their dream careers. With presentation slides, student worksheets, research templates, and career pennants, the resource guides students through a thorough research and presentation assignment.

Is this job right for me? | Career Research Exploration | Vocational Skills
By Transition Abilities
Grades: 4th-12th

Elementary, middle school, and high school students alike can experience the thrill of investigating their future careers. This no-prep career research project lets students choose, research, and plan professions they’d like to have after high school. Although the project was designed for special education students, it’s just as helpful for mainstream classes studying career exploration.

Focus on specific career field research

For students who already have an idea of what they’d like to do, use field-specific career exploration projects to dive deeper into professional requirements and details. Use these resources in career-minded academies or in general career exploration units.

Career Exploration Worksheets for STEM Jobs Research Project
By Meredith Anderson – Momgineer STEM Activities
Grades: 6th-10th
Standards: CCSS CCRA.W.4, 6, 7, 8, 10

Are your middle and high school students interested in STEM careers? Have them explore the needed qualifications, education, and training for jobs in STEM fields with a resource that includes a digital research project and research tips to get started.

Career Exploration, Creative Career Activities with Career Exploration Project
By Spark Creativity
Grades: 8th-12th
Standards: CCSS RI.9-10.10; W.9-10.4, 7, 9

Some students are looking for more unconventional and creative career ideas. Foster their interests and intrigue with a resource that focuses on 21st-century life skills, how to begin a start-up, and jobs for learners who truly think outside the box.

Business, Management, & Administration Career Cluster Research Digital Activity
By Business Education with Denise Leigh
Grades: 9th-12th

Help future captains of industry get a foot in the door with a business education career cluster project. Students explore the six main career pathways in business, management, and administration to learn more about important career options in the corporate world today.

Career / Vocational Trade Schools Exploration
By the small but mighty teacher
Grades: 5th-12th

Perfect for career exploration units focused on vocational skills, this resource includes reflection and project sheets for students to explore multiple careers obtained with a trade school degree. They discover how to become a chef, electrician, welder, mechanic, hairdresser, and more with informational texts and writing assignments in the resource.

Play engaging career exploration games

High schoolers can explore different career options and industries in a fun, engaging way with career exploration games. They provide students with hands-on experiences that are sure to spark curiosity, facilitate discussion, and inspire informed career choices.

Career Exploration Game Job Salaries Fun Activity
By Career And Employment Prep
Grades: 6th-12th

Knowing a career’s potential salary is an important part of choosing a future profession! Six print-and-go PDF pages get students familiar with careers and salaries based on what they already know, plus additional research to get current numbers from actual salary data.

Career Card Grab Game for High School Career Development
By The Counselor Clique
Grades: 9-12

Would you rather be an astronomer or a hydrologist? What about an animal control worker or a video game designer? Students play an engaging card game to match 54 different careers with their definitions. Teams work together to get the highest career score in the class!

Career Exploration for High School Students is Easy With TPT

Career exploration activities for high schoolers are an excellent capstone or senior project. Students leave your classroom with a better understanding of their future careers — and of themselves. Discover more activities for career and technical education on TPT, and start your career exploration workshop today!