California Academic Content Standards for 7-12th gradeCareer Technology Education High School |
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1 Metacognition: means “thinking about thinking”. Metacognition refers to higher order thinking involving the “learners” active control over the cognitive processes engaged in learning. It entails planning how to approach a given learning task, monitoring their personal comprehension, and evaluating their progress toward the completion of that task. Put simply, metacognition is a buzzword in educational psychology for thinking before doing something. Metacognitive strategies are memorable plans or approaches that students use to problem-solve. These strategies include the student’s thinking as well as their physical actions. Common metacognitive strategies include: mnemonics, in the form of easy to remember phrases or through pictures that are easy to recall, asking for clarification, etc. |
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Standards and Subcomponents Standards serve as the basis for the curriculum frameworks, instructional materials, and statewide assessments in California. The CCTE model curriculum standards have been developed for use at the secondary level, grades seven through twelve. There are two levels of detail in the standards: standards and subcomponents. Standards are general expectations of what students should know and be able to do. Each standard has at least two subcomponents that elaborate on the specific knowledge and skills encompassed by the standard. There are also two different types of standards in each sector: foundation standards and pathway standards. Foundation Standards There are 11 foundation standards that all students need to master to be successful in the career technical education curriculum and in the workplace. These standards are similar to the competencies described in the June 1991 report issued by the U. S. Department of Labor, Secretary’s Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS). The foundation standards are uniform in all sectors, although the subcomponents will differ. They cover the 11 areas essential to all students’ success:
* As of this revision, Bridge lessons only address the *ed standards above (2.0, 3.0, 4.0. 5.0) |
Bridge Lesson(s) that address standard and/or benchmark |
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2.0 Communications Students understand the principles of effective oral, written, and multimedia communication in a variety of formats and contexts. (The standards listed below retain in parentheses the numbering as specified in the English–language arts content standards adopted by the State Board of Education.) |
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The foundation Communications standards are primarily drawn from the English– language arts standards. Like the Academics standards, foundation standards listed in 2.0 were chosen to reflect those taught or reinforced across all pathways. They also vary considerably between industry sectors. Foundation Communication standards are featured in the discussions of integrating academic and CTE content standards throughout this framework and feature prominently in the examples of assignments/assessments by pathway in Part II. |
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2.1 Reading Specific applications of Reading Comprehension standards (grades nine and ten): |
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2.6 Demonstrate use of sophisticated learning tools by following technical directions (e.g., those found with graphic calculators and specialized software programs and in access guides to World Wide Web sites on the Internet). |
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Specific applications of Reading Comprehension standards (grades eleven and twelve): |
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2.3 Verify and clarify facts presented in other types of expository texts by using a variety of consumer, workplace, and public documents. |
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3.0 Career Planning and Management Students understand how to make effective decisions, use career information, and manage personal career plans: |
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Career planning and Management differs from the other foundation standards in that disciplines other than CTE rarely if ever teach this essential knowledge and skill base. To ensure thorough guidance, this framework addresses the unique Career Planning and Management standards in relative depth. In all 15 industry sectors, CTE foundation standard 3.0 delineates the required knowledge and skills for “Career Planning and Management” in the following common standards: 3.1-3.6. Meeting these rigorous standards requires a logical, comprehensive system of career awareness, exploration, and preparation that begins in middle school and continues through transition to work and/or postsecondary training or education. |
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3.1 Know the personal qualifications, interests, aptitudes, information, and skills necessary to succeed in careers. |
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3.2 Understand the scope of career opportunities and know the requirements for education, training, and licensure. |
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Foundation standards 3.1 and 3.2. These standards call for an initial understanding of the range of career opportunities and the requirements for success in each. The activities most often included are interest inventories and aptitude testing, followed by student research into possible careers reflected in their interest and aptitude data. Student investigations generally include the personal qualifications, skills, education, training, and licensure necessary to succeed in various careers identified with their interests and aptitudes. Their findings then allow them to narrow and better define their interest. Activities for Foundation standards 3.1 and 3.2. Schools use a broad spectrum of activities to address these standards, including: 1. Online and pencil/paper assessments of interest, aptitude, values, and attitude 2. Classroom-based resources such as The Real Game California available from the California Career Resource Network at http://www.californiacareers.info 3. Online, software, or workbook guided career exploration 4. Classroom speakers, career fairs, “Power Lunches,” and informational interviews 5. Films/videos such as those available online at http://www.cacareerzone.org 6. Research using online resources or textbooks, trade books, and reference books 7. Online, software, or physical games Most of these activities are commonly used in career awareness/exploration. One of the less frequently used, informational interviews is of particular interest because it involves active learning and makes the connection between career awareness and exploration and work-based learning. Informational interviewing or research interviewing is one of the best sources for gathering information about an industry and the careers within it. An informational interview is the opposite of a job interview: the student initiates the interchange by requesting the interview and the student asks the questions. The purpose is not to get a job, but to explore careers and clarify a career goal, discover employment opportunities that are not advertised, build confidence for later job interviews, and access the most up-to-date career information. Teachers assigning informational interviewing usually require students to: 1. Identify a target career or industry through assessment and awareness activities. 2. Prepare for the interview by conducting appropriate research, developing potential questions, and conducting mock interviews in the classroom. 3. Identify possible people to interview, beginning with personal networks and moving on to professional organizations, unions, employer organizations, and other sources. 4. Contact the individual to be interviewed (securing his or her name from a phone call or Web site search) by letter first and then by phone to arrange the interview. 5. Conduct the interview using appropriate protocol (dress, promptness, professional demeanor, referring to questions, taking notes as appropriate). 6. Follow up by recording all the information gathered in a standard reporting format and sending a thank-you note to the interviewee. Interviewing is one of the English–language arts (grades nine and ten) standards (Listening/ Speaking 2.3) that is incorporated into many of the Sector 2.0 foundation standards. To help students prepare for success in this standard, teachers also sometimes provide some generic “starter questions” for the students to build on, such as: 1. On a typical day in this position, what do you do? 2. What part of this job do you find most satisfying? Most challenging? 3. How do you see jobs in this field changing in the future? 4. If you could do things all over again, would you choose the same path for yourself? Why? What would you change? 5. With the information you have about my education, skills, and experience, what other fields or jobs would you suggest I research further before I make a final decision? Delivery methodologies. Middle and high schools have typically responded with a variety of delivery methods to address foundation standards 3.1 and 3.2. For an overview of the broad scope of careers, schools offer a range of delivery points: 1. Career awareness courses. Many California high schools offer a one-semester career awareness course in the ninth or tenth grade that incorporates a variety of activities, resources, and materials. In some schools, teachers of the career awareness courses collaborate with English teachers so that career investigation results in a research or “I Search” paper that is graded and credited in English as well as the career awareness class. In most career awareness curricula, the school’s CTE pathways and courses are reviewed for all students. Many times, eleventh and twelfth grade students from the CTE programs will be invited to speak in the courses, demonstrating their products, answering student questions, and showing videos of their activities. 2. Career awareness units in generic courses. Some schools offer a generic one-semester course that addresses a potpourri of study skills, career awareness, and state requirements. These courses have titles such as “Ninth Grade Orientation,” “Life Skills,” or “Preparing for Success.” The career awareness unit in these courses usually provides access to the assessment tools mentioned above, allows for some initial investigation, and provides an overview of CTE pathways, programs offered at the school, and courses available. These course teachers can also work with the English Department to assign a collaborative research paper. 3. Career awareness units in advisory programs. Advisory systems are a proven adjunct to high school counseling; see the discussion of advisory programs in Aiming High. Schools with advisory systems often include career awareness and exploration as a part of the program each year in grades nine through twelve. The advantage of this approach is that the students’ exploration matures as they do. Information and activities presented in this venue are usually similar to those in the semester career awareness course, though they may be delivered across both grades nine and ten. The amount of time spent on career awareness activities in advisory programs varies greatly depending on the advisory curriculum and the number of hours of advisory courses per week. Because the counseling department frequently creates the career awareness curriculum for advisory, it is essential for CTE instructors to work with the department to ensure that CTE pathways and courses are a part of the advisory curricular materials. 4. Career awareness units in introductory CTE courses. CTE introductory courses, including those provided in middle school, almost always include career awareness regarding the industry and often provide information and exploration opportunities in related industries. Later, students can generalize the skills they learned while exploring the target sector to increase their awareness of other industries. Career awareness units in introductory CTE courses always include thorough exploration of CTE pathway options available at the high school level and their connection to postsecondary education and training. 5. Career centers. Many California high schools have a dedicated Career Center staffed through the district or the ROCP. How the centers are used varies widely; however, in some schools the Career Center delivers a career awareness curriculum, either in a unit or in a series of activities, during the school day or after school. For some, the completion of the units or activities is optional, while for others it is required. One advantage of using the Career Center as the delivery point is access to most of the school’s career awareness and exploration materials and resources. Another advantage may be that the school’s CTE programs can be prominently displayed with literature, pathway-created videos, samples of student project work, and similar enticing displays. 6. Career days and fairs. The terms “career day,” “career fair,” and “job fair” are often used interchangeably to mean a time when students can visit booths sponsored by employers—public and private—to explore options and inquire about part-time, summer, or full-time post-graduation career opportunities. To maximize learning, most schools find that students must be prepared in advance, reviewing the list of employers who will be represented, determining which booths to visit, conducting some level of research on the companies and organizations, creating a sound bite self-introduction (30–90 seconds about knowledge, skills, abilities, and coursework completed), or developing a list of questions to ask. Students actively looking for a job should also have their resumes and portfolio, if appropriate. After the fair, students should be encouraged to write to at least one business to thank them for their participation. Career days are also an excellent opportunity to advertise CTE course options. Each district and ROCP program might have a separate booth with information, demonstrations, games, or use other methods to attract visiting students. 7. Career exploration units in CTE concentration or capstone courses. Most CTE concentration and capstone courses include an in-depth study of the industry and the pathway in terms of career opportunities at various levels of education and training. At this point, students are well into the career exploration process and are actively measuring themselves against the personal qualifications, skills, education, training, and licensure requirements for various occupations within the pathway. Through the concentration and capstone course work, students further define their focus within the pathway, consistently adjusting as they reflect on their experience. CTE teachers take an active role in helping students make these judgments. 8. Senior projects. In many high schools that require senior projects, the projects must in some way reflect the student’s current pathway choice. A person planning to enter nursing, for example, could investigate the role of nurses in responses to international disasters, learn and report on how to help elderly relatives at home remember to take their medications, or do a computer- generated model of nursing needs if California were subject to a terrorist Ebola attack. Because the purpose of senior projects is to stretch inquiry and presentation skills in these almost-adults, as well as expand their horizons, requiring that the project be related to a potential future career results in mastery of multiple standards. Materials and resources. What materials and resources are chosen and how they are used in career awareness and exploration depends greatly on the venue for service delivery. For example, a full semester class of career awareness and exploration may have a specific textbook, whereas a Career Center-based program may use more online and hands-on activities. |
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3.3 Develop a career plan that is designed to reflect career interests, pathways, and postsecondary options. |
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Foundation standard 3.3. This standard requires students to develop “a career plan that is designed to reflect career interests, pathways, and postsecondary options.” Most guidance experts agree that every student should have an eight-year plan that facilitates their transition from middle school to high school, ensures that they will successfully complete four years of high school, and explores their post-graduation plans. These career plans include: 1. Appropriate choice of course work based on interests and goals 2. Strategies for successful transitions between middle and high school 3. Strategies for successful transitions between high school and postsecondary training, education, and/or employment 4. Strategies for being successful at work Career plans help individual students realize the benefits that come from planning and pursuing future goals, both long- and short-term. Schools use a variety of approaches to this task, such as: 1. Creating and updating the plan in the career awareness courses or units delivered through course work (stand-alone, generic, CTE), through the Career Center, or through Advisory 2. Creating and updating the plan through individual counseling sessions Often schools combine three plans—graduation, college, and career—so that students recognize the linkages and options available. These “success plans,” as they are sometimes termed, carry a record of career assessments (aptitude, attitude, interest), work-based learning, and short- and long-term career goals, as well as the record of high school courses completed and grades, progress on graduation requirements, STAR and CAHSEE test results, and other academic tests, such as EAP and SAT. With this information all in one plan, the counselor, advisor, or Career Center facilitator can help the student link academic and CTE course progress with postsecondary goals. Career or success plans are most valuable when they are updated regularly. Students do this through annual meetings with a school counselor, advisor, or Career Center facilitator. In this meeting, the adult reviews the plan from the previous year, works with the student to update work-based experience and preparation, updates academic achievement and course completion, and helps the student re-examine and explore career interests. Updating the plan keeps the student mindful of career preparation while selecting high school courses for the next year. Many schools send the career/success plan home for parent signature, and in this way, the plan also serves to remind parents that career preparation is one of the purposes of the high school. Sometimes the updating of the plan calls for the student to do additional investigations, such as informational interviews, and family members may be able to assist the student in completing these assignments. |
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3.4 Understand the role and function of professional organizations, industry associations, and organized labor in a productive society. |
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Foundation standard 3.4 states that students must “Understand the role and function of professional organizations, industry associations, and organized labor in a productive society.” Schools choosing to address this standard through the Twelfth grade economics course required for graduation will ensure that all students demonstrate mastery. The academic standard for Principles of Economics 12.4 states, “Students analyze the elements of the U.S. labor market in a global setting.” As part of that analysis, students must “Understand the operations of the labor market, including the circumstances surrounding the establishment of principal American labor unions, procedures that unions use to gain benefits for their members, the effects of unionization, the minimum wage, and unemployment insurance.” This requirement is broad enough to include the elements of foundation standard 3.4 and, because it is in a course required for graduation, calls for mastery by all students. Most CTE concentration and capstone courses also deal with the roles and realities of professional organization, industry associations, and organized labor in the industry and pathway. CTE students often additionally acquire first-hand knowledge of professional organizations, industry associations, and organized labor through student organizations, such as HOSA and DECA, which may receive substantial support from employers, labor, and professional organizations, allowing students to become well acquainted with their role of these groups in the economics of the industry. |
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3.5 Understand the past, present, and future trends that affect careers, such as technological developments and societal trends, and the resulting need for lifelong learning. |
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Foundation standard 3.5. This calls for students to “Understand the past, present, and future trends that affect careers, such as technological developments and societal trends, and the resulting need for lifelong learning.” Americans are witnessing vast changes in the very nature and concept of work through globalization, technology, and labor market shifts. The demand on workers to engage in many career and industry sector transitions throughout life—12 to 25 times according to several analysts2—means that students must master career self- management competencies they will use for a lifetime. Thus, the old concept of career exploration and guidance as a one-time event must be replaced by lifelong career self-management. And schools must help students master the requisite skills, knowledge, and attitudes. The understanding called for in foundation standard 3.5 must be delivered in CTE coursework, especially in concentration and capstone courses. However, to reach all students, schools should seriously consider addressing this standard in social studies courses such as U.S. History and Economics. In these classes, students can learn about the changing economic forces that create the need for lifelong career self-management. The personal skills to accompany that knowledge are delivered through foundation standard 3.6. |
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3.6 Know important strategies for self-promotion in the hiring process, such as job applications, resume writing, interviewing skills, and preparation of a portfolio. |
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Foundation standard 3.6. This standard requires that students “Know important strategies for self-promotion in the hiring process, such as job applications, résumé writing, interviewing skills, and preparation of a portfolio.” These key strategies for the future work force include career self-management skills as well as what have been historically called employability skills. Employability skills focus on the system of traditional paid employment and the needs of employers in that system. Career self-management skills serve the needs of the students themselves, equipping them with the skills to transition repeatedly between different types of work and learning in the new workforce. Many schools have programs for teaching employability skills. These are generally found in the following venues: 1. Advisory. Typically, advisory is conducted by grade level, so that appropriate employability skill-building activities are included across grades nine through twelve. Employability skills such as practice interviewing, job application completion and development, and electronic or physical portfolio development are generally a part of the curriculum in grades eleven and twelve. The advantage of this approach is that all students have the opportunity to master these essential skills. To be successful in this approach, advisors should be supported in their teaching of these techniques through professional development. 2. Senior Project. In schools that require a senior project related to a career pathway, many employability skills, especially interviewing, are taught as part of the senior project preparation. If this is the school’s primary venue for teaching employability skills, professional development can again be highly effective in helping teachers cover the skills comprehensively. 3. Internship and work experience. Internship and work experience programs almost always teach employability skills, as these are prerequisites for finding job leads and securing a position. Thus, if the school requires internships of all students, this is an effective delivery mode for the employability skills portion of foundation standard 3.6. If not, the school may use internship and work experience as the intensive point of delivery of these skills and provide more general training in another venue that reaches all students. The faculty member facilitating these activities usually has significant expertise in employability skills and may also be involved in staff development for other faculty members. 4. Career centers. In some schools, the Career Center offers training in employability skills on a regular basis; attendance is voluntary. The advantage of this system is that it provides the skill instruction as almost “on-demand” learning. The disadvantage is that not all students avail themselves of these services and thus may leave high school without mastery of this standard. 5. CTE concentration and capstone courses. In almost all CTE concentration and capstone courses, including cooperative education and community classrooms, employability skills are taught to mastery. In some settings, such as Career Academies, the skills may not be part of the CTE course curriculum exclusively; that is, they may be taught in several venues. The advantage of this approach is that a student may have multiple exposures to learning the skills at different levels of maturity and understanding, resulting in a deeper level of mastery than a “one-shot” approach can provide. The disadvantage is that students not enrolled in CTE miss this important instruction unless the school has another venue for its delivery. Recognition. The final element in a comprehensive and logical system of career exploration and preparation is a program of recognition. While most schools offer certificates of completion for various benchmarks in CTE, not all do so in a way that affirms CTE’s role in preparation for postsecondary training, education, and employment. Skills certification, internship completion, training-related job placement, industry certification, and articulation into advanced training are examples of accomplishments that warrant high-visibility public acknowledgment by the full school in such venues as student award nights, press releases, graduation programs, and presentations. This level of recognition underscores the importance of students’ career choice and career milestones at the high school level. |
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5.0 Problem Solving and Critical Thinking Students understand how to create alternative solutions by using critical and creative thinking skills, such as logical reasoning, analytical thinking, and problem-solving techniques: |
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5.0 Problem Solving and Critical Thinking Problem solving and critical thinking skills are required in every secondary school discipline, but perhaps only in CTE is the focus of the problem solving and critical thinking primarily on real-world applications. Developing critical thinking and problem-solving skills is essential for all students. However, the relationship between intelligence and critical thinking/problem solving is not linear; one doesn’t necessarily produce the other. Intelligence provides the raw materials for the critical thinking/problem-solving production process—and all students deserve the opportunity to apply their intelligence to these production skills. The workplace no longer offers a hierarchy in which front-line workers complete mindless and repetitive tasks while their supervisors (or the supervisor’s supervisors) solve the problems. Employers expect high school graduates to have and apply these problem-solving skills appropriately and in a timely manner. Thus all sectors have included the following problem solving and critical thinking standards in their foundation standards: · 5.1 Apply appropriate problem-solving strategies and critical thinking skills to work-related issues and tasks. · 5.2 Understand the systematic problem solving models that incorporate input, process, outcome, and feedback components. · 5.3 Use critical thinking skills to make informed decisions and solve problems. |
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5.3 Use critical thinking skills to make informed decisions and solve problems. |
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Foundation standards 5.1 and 5.3: These two standards require students to apply an appropriate problem-solving and/or critical thinking strategy at the right time to generate appropriate decisions and/or solutions. Problem-solving models are addressed in Standard 5.2, but students must also understand, as well as practice, critical thinking. Understanding critical thinking is part of metacognition, or learning about learning, which strengthens intellectual capacity. As research has demonstrated and Marzano et al. have translated for mainstream educators, questioning techniques do make a significant difference in the level of critical thinking promoted in the classroom. In Critical Thinking: How to Prepare Students for a Rapidly Changing World, Richard Paul demonstrates the use of Socratic questioning techniques to build critical thinking skills. In Socratic questioning, one question’s response will lead to another type of question not pre- determined by the instructor. For example, a response to a question that calls for analysis—say, contrasting safety guarantees of two child different child car restraint systems—might be followed up with a question of clarification, such as “What do you think is the primary difference?” or a question that probes assumptions such as “What is Susan assuming in her response?” or a question that probes reasons/evidence such as “What other information do you need to make a decision?” Teaching these standards in CTE courses involves three steps: 1. Raising student awareness about critical thinking—what it is and how it is done (the metacognition approach to the instruction) 2. Having students practice critical thinking through strategies such as those discussed above 3. Asking students to use critical thinking strategies and methodologies in applied decision-making lab situations |
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