writing a resume lesson plans for high schools

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Lesson Plan: Resume Writing for Teens

Description.

In this lesson, students will develop a resume, write business correspondence, complete a sample job application, and explain the protocol for selecting and using appropriate references for job applications.

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Resumes and Cover Letters for High School Students

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Today's high school students must market their experiences, skills, achievements, and accolades to set them apart from others when applying to college or for a job. This lesson takes students through the steps of creating an effective resume and cover letter using ReadWriteThink's Resume Generator and Letter Generator.

Featured Resources

• Resume Generator : This ReadWriteThink resource takes students through the process of creating a resume one step at a time.  
• Letter Generator : This ReadWriteThink resource helps students create a professional cover letter.  
• Sample High School Resumes and Cover Letters : These realistic resumes and cover letters help students visualize and generate content for their own documents.

From Theory to Practice

Common core standards.

This resource has been aligned to the Common Core State Standards for states in which they have been adopted. If a state does not appear in the drop-down, CCSS alignments are forthcoming.

State Standards

This lesson has been aligned to standards in the following states. If a state does not appear in the drop-down, standard alignments are not currently available for that state.

Materials and Technology

• LCD Projector  
• Computers with Internet access
• The 3 Fs of Resume Writing  
• My Resume Ideas: Getting Started  
• Steps to Creating a Cover Letter  
• Sample High School Resumes and Cover Letters  
• Resume / Cover Letter Rubric  
• Visualizing Your Resume: Graphic Organizer  
• Visualizing Your Cover Letter: Graphic Organizer

Preparation

• Prepare copies of the  Sample High School Resumes and Cover Letters printout so that students may review it.  
• Reserve space in a classroom that has access to the Internet, specifically ReadWriteThink’s  Resume Generator and Letter Generator .  
• Prepare copies of the following printouts: The 3 Fs of Resume Writing , My Resume Ideas: Getting Started , Steps to Creating a Cover Letter , Sample High School Resumes and Cover Letters, Visualizing Your Resume: Graphic Organizer , and Visualizing Your Cover Letter: Graphic Organizer .

Student Objectives

Students will

• Understand the function, form, and effectiveness of a resume by examining and discussing sample resumes with their classmates  
• Demonstrate the importance of rhetorical situations by selling themselves to a defined audience  
• Develop a working resume by using the Resume Generator  
• Recognize how a cover letter works in conjunction with a resume by drafting them for a similar purpose  
• Write a cover letter by using the Letter Generator

Lesson 1: What is a Resume?

• Introduce students to resumes as a genre of writing: professional writing. Discuss how this is different from academic genres in that it serves a different purpose and is intended for a different audience. In short, it is a type of writing by an author who is trying to get something. As a result, it is an extremely persuasive style of writing. Share examples of when a person would need a resume, such as applying for a job, a scholarship, or an award, or when creating a portfolio of one’s work.  
• Prepare students to understand the purpose of a resume, including its F unction, F orm, and (e) F fectiveness (the 3 Fs). Take an informal poll of the class, asking who has heard of a resume before this class, who has seen one, and who has one of their own. Based on the results, you may ask students to share their experiences to add to the conversation.  
• Function: The function of a resume is to inform the audience about you in order to accomplish something. What you’re trying to accomplish depends on what you’re trying to do. This might include getting a job, getting into college, winning a scholarship, or being selected for an internship. There are many reasons to show people your resume.  
• Form: Resumes need to look a certain way. This is considered their form. People who read resumes expect them to include specific information, such as your name, address, contact information, education, past jobs, volunteer experience, and special skills. If a resume does not look like a traditional resume, the reader may be confused and think the writer is not educated about writing proper resumes.  
• (e)Ffectiveness: For a resume to be effective, it must demonstrate your knowledge of both function and form. An effective resume - Has a clear purpose that shows why you are writing it - Is visually appropriate and appealing, or easy to read - Includes all the necessary information about the writer - Is grammatically correct with no errors in punctuation or spelling
• Share copies of the resume printout. You might begin discussing these by putting students into small groups first to review. Tell them to identify what they see as the 3 Fs: Function, Form, and (e)Ffectiveness.  
• Return together as a class, and discuss each F and how students determined what it was.

Lesson 2: Developing Content for Your Resume

• Review the  The 3 Fs of Resume Writing from the previous lesson.  
• Discuss the two types of resume: chronological and functional. Ask students which style they think is best for them.  
• Show the sample resumes from the previous lesson. Ask students to identify which one is chronological and which one is functional.  
• Share online resume reference sites such as  College Admissions High School Resume and  High School Students Need a Resume Too with the class to present additional ways of thinking about the construction of resumes. (If you are not in a computer lab or a room with Internet access, tell students to view these sites later on their own.)  
• Have students brainstorm content for their resumes using the printout  My Resume Ideas: Getting Started as a guide.  
• Begin completing the parts of the printout. Move around the room answering questions as students work.  
• Ask students to complete the printout on their own before the next lesson.

Lesson 3: Defining Audience and Purpose

• Have students take out their completed  My Resume Ideas: Getting Started printout. Put them into small groups to share their work with others.  
• What was easy about filling this out? What was difficult?
• What sections contained the most and least information? Why?
• The audience refers to anyone who will review the resume, so we must consider all audiences, both primary and secondary.
• The purpose refers to why the audience is looking at the resume and what they will be looking for, so we must ask ourselves what they want to read.

Lesson 4: Using Resume Builder

• Take students to a computer lab with access to the Internet and  Resume Generator to complete this lesson. Have them log into the Resume Builder site. As they do so, remind them about the time limit for creating their draft in class. They should structure their time accordingly.  
• Using their notes from the  My Resume Ideas: Getting Started printout, ask students to go through the process of entering their information. Show students the features of the tool, from the additional information about resumes on the first page to the audio feature accompanying the site that enables them to hear the information aloud.  
• When they have completed their resumes, have students save them and also print a copy to bring to the next class.

Lesson 5: Peer Review

• Ask students to take out the printed copies of their resumes. Discuss how resumes today can be printed and submitted to the audience, as they have prepared, but they can also be submitted electronically. In that case, the resume writer needs to understand how to save a resume as a .pdf or how to create a resume with very little formatting, with only the basic information listed and no fancy spacing or bullets used. Connect this to their use of Resume Generator , and discuss how this would be similar to or different from what they just did.  
• Put students into small groups to peer review their resumes. Encourage students to review their peers’ resumes for the 3Fs: Function, Form, and (e)Ffectiveness.

Lesson 6: What is a Cover Letter?

• What did you like about using Resume Builder to create your resume?  
• What did you find particularly easy or difficult about the process?  
• What do you like or dislike about your completed resume? d. What would you like to change about it?  
• Function: Cover letters accompany resumes to introduce the reader of the resume to the writer. They personalize the resume, allowing the writer to provide more detail about him- or herself and any relevant experience. Many people think of cover letters as a way for the writer’s true voice to come through.  
• Form: Like resumes, cover letters also have a typical form: that of a business letter. The writer has to know the correct placement of the heading, date, salutation, body paragraphs, closing, and signature. Readers expect a cover letter to have certain features. If they aren’t included, the reader may think the writer is not knowledgeable and, therefore, not ready for whatever he or she is trying to accomplish by submitting the cover letter and resume.  
• Has a clear purpose that shows why you are writing it  
• Is visually appropriate and appealing, or easy to read  
• Includes additional relevant information about the writer  
• Is grammatically correct with no errors in punctuation or spelling  
• Share an online reference about cover letters, such as Sample Cover Letter for High School Students , to support the present discussion, and raise or discuss any questions as a result of it. (If you are not in a computer lab or a room with Internet access, tell students to view this site later on their own.)  
• Show the sample cover letters written by high school students in the  Sample High School Resumes and Cover Letters printout. Discuss these with the students in relation to the 3 Fs: What is the function of the cover letter (its purpose), what is unique about its form (design), and how effective do students think this cover letter will be?

Lesson 7: Developing Your Cover Letter

• Explain to students that they are going to create a rough outline of a cover letter that could accompany their resume. Provide the  Visualizing Your Cover Letter: Graphic Organizer printout to fill out. They may do this individually or in small groups. Move around the room responding to students’ work and offering suggestions.  
• Once students have a good start on this, provide the more detailed  Steps to Creating a Cover Letter printout. Students should use this to create a draft of their cover letters, due at the next class. Remind students that their time in the lab during the next session will be limited, so they need to have a full draft completed.

Lesson 8: Finishing Your Cover Letter

• Once again, have students meet in the computer lab to type their cover letters using the  Steps to Creating a Cover Letter printout and Letter Generator . You may want to remind them about their time constraints and the need to organize their time.  
• Using Letter Generator, have students transform their drafts into finished cover letters.  
• Make sure students save their work and also print a copy.  
• At the end of class, ask students to submit their resumes and cover letters to you for a grade. Use the  Resume / Cover Letter Rubric to assist you in assigning a grade.
• Have students submit first and second drafts of the resume and cover letter to you for comments or an early grade, additional revision, and a new/final grade.  
• Do more detailed work with cover letters, including researching jobs and researching examples of cover letters for specific jobs. Then have students write cover letters tailored to these jobs.  
• Include a discussion of writing essays and personal statements for college applications.  
• Connect discussions of resume and cover letter writing to students’ college aspirations, including their ideas for majors, careers, courses, and activities to become involved in. You may consider reviewing online resources, including ACT .

Student Assessment / Reflections

• Review students’ printouts for The 3 Fs of Resume Writing, My Resume Ideas: Getting Started, Visualizing Your Resume: Graphic Organizer, Visualizing Your Cover Letter: Graphic Organizer, and Steps to Creating a Cover Letter after each lesson in which they are used or collected. Make sure students are correctly identifying the parts and including information as needed. If a pattern of errors or misunderstandings occurs, review them with students at the beginning of the next lesson.  
• Collect typed drafts of students’ resumes and cover letters as created using the Resume Generator and Letter Generator. Review and grade them using the Resume/Cover Letter Rubric. Address the grade and comments when returning the resumes and cover letters to students, especially if students are allowed to revise for a new grade.

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10 Helpful Resume Writing Activities For High School Students

“The challenge of life, I have found, is to build a resume that doesn’t simply tell a story about what you want to be, but it’s a story about who you want to be” . – Oprah Winfrey

As beautifully defined by the above quote, a resume is a story of the stepping stones that you’ve taken so far in order to become who you want to be. Having a compelling resume is a must for every individual to thrive in the competitive landscape, be it a high school student or a working professional. 

Resume writing is a crucial skill that high school students need to develop as this is the time they prepare for their higher education and enter the corporate world. It is not only about enlisting skills and achievements, but it requires thoughtful organizational skills, an ability to present qualifications and a good hold of language skills. 

To quip high school students about the process of resume writing, summarized below are some creative activities aiming to guide them in creating impactful resumes and setting a strong foundation for their careers.

Discover, collaborate & reflect: Engaging resume writing activities for high schoolers

1. resume redesign .

With the availability of a number of templates for resumes, it becomes quite difficult to select the suitable and relevant one on the basis of the unique information to include, especially for high schoolers who are bound to get overwhelmed being their first time for jobs as well as college applications. 

How to do the activity:

• Firstly, educators need to familiarize students with every important element that has to be there in a resume for high school students and the optional ones that are not necessary but can be included as per the need and availability. 
• Now, students need to make a note of their information, and based on that, they have to explore and experiment with different designs for their resumes. 
• Instruct them that they can try different fonts and layouts and design at least 5 resumes for themselves. 
• Fix one day when every student has to come prepared with their designed resumes and every participant will present their designs to the class and the class will rate every design out of 5

Here, feedback and rating play a crucial role in helping students select the most appropriate one for themselves. Also, when they explore and experiment with different designs, they familiarize themselves with different layouts and structures which might be helpful in any other cases of resume designing.

2. Discover yourself

Let’s use an effective strategy of SWOT Analysis which is used for marketing to discover ourselves. Yes, you read that right! SWOT stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats. In order to build an efficient resume, one must know about themself in terms of what they are good at and what areas need to be worked upon.

How to do the activity:  

• Explain to the class about the strategy and its elements. 
• Now ask them to take a sheet of paper and divide it into 4 sections. Name each section with Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. 
• Set a timer of about 5-10 minutes for each section and ask students to think about themselves and fill in each section. 

Strengths will help them know what they’re good at that can also be referred to as positive points about themselves. The weaknesses section will include the negative points or what they can not do or are not good at which will help them know and narrow down the options to what they can do in the future. 

The opportunities section will include the areas they think they can ace if they work on it which will help them know the areas of improvement. Last, but not least will be threats in which they need to write about any external threats that you can not control but can be reduced by controlling other factors (can be external or internal) causing it.

3. Improvise your Resume

Every job profile is different and that calls for different requirements such as unique skill sets, achievements, and qualifications. 

• Explain to students how customizing the resume for every job or college application they’re applying to is important and not the same single resume works for every application.
• Ask students to search and explore different job openings on job portals or company official websites. 
• Shortlist 3 job openings that they think are suitable for them and go through the details of what is the profile, what are requirements, and what will be the daily responsibilities. 
• Now they’ve to work on their resume and customize it for all the 3 profiles they shortlisted.
• Once done, check their resume and provide feedback. 

One thing that students need to know here is that customizing a resume based on different applications doesn’t mean we’ve to lie and make it exactly what is the requirement, instead, it means presenting your skills and qualifications, experience in such a way that it resonates with the application requirements. This activity can also be done for college applications.

4. Resume Peer Review

Feedback is significant for everything we do. Be it education or resume writing. 

• Start giving numbers 1 to 10 to every student, or can be according to the number of students in a class but make sure only 2 students can have the same number.
• Now, the students with the same number will form a pair. 
• Ask students to exchange their resumes with their pair and they need to check and evaluate each other’s resumes based on what they know about their pair and also set certain criteria for the evaluation. 
• After they are done evaluating, they need to share the insights they find about the resume. Share what they think is missing in the resume, what areas can be improved and what are the good and the positive points about the resume. Teachers can check with every pair and share their insights too. 

This activity will help to get the different perspectives that you might be missing or are not aware of. Additionally, it will help with observation skills as well as help students revisit the resume-building crucial points.

5. Hire for your company

This activity will give students an opportunity to act as HR of different companies and evaluate different resumes. 

• Gather some samples of resumes for different job profiles. Make sure there are enough samples that every student in a class receives 2 samples at least to compare and evaluate. 
• Now give a situation to the students such as “Suppose you’re an HR manager of XYZ company hiring for customer support profile. You’ve got certain resumes and you need to check and evaluate them and see if you want to shortlist them for an interview or not. If yes, then why, and if not, then why not. Observe carefully and provide a proper explanation for the same” 
• Now give 2 resume samples to each student and let them scan them and come to a conclusion. 
• Call each student one by one to present their findings to the class to which classmates and the educator can give feedback and share insights on the observation skills of the student. 

This will let students think from the recruiter’s point of view and they will get clarity about their resume about how to write and present their skills and qualifications.

6. Practice cover letters

Cover letters are what answer “why you should be hired for this role” and in case of college applications, it will be the statement of purpose. Cover letters need to be very straightforward that require good writing skills. For this, high school students can employ creative writing activities to learn and practice the same.

• Students have to create a 1-2 minute elevator pitch for themselves keeping in mind their resume and the job profile they’re applying for. 
• Instruct students that they need to include examples of why they think they’re good at every skill they’ve mentioned. 
• Instruct the students that in this 1-2 minute pitch, you’ve to convince the HR (here students) how you can be an asset to the company.
• Ask the class to share their insights about what points are good and what can be better. 

This activity will help you write an effective cover letter and make a good first impression.

7. Powerful Words Resume Challenge

Word choice is critical when it comes to resumes. It is always said that action words are powerful to describe what you have done to highlight your experience and persuade potential employers and college administrators. 

• Prepare handouts for all the students of the class with all the powerful action words that can be used in a resume and explain how the use of these words can make an impact and make the resume stand out. 
• Discuss every word, the meaning of it, and an example of how it can be used in a resume and under what situations. 
• Now ask students to use the handout and try to incorporate as many words as they can in their resume and then give feedback to each and every student. 

This can also be an improving communication skill activity that will familiarize them with using these words in their daily conversation. 

8. Resume Do’s and Don’ts

This activity is to equip high school students about what to strictly avoid while writing resumes and what to follow to make the resumes more impactful and stand out. 

• Make different slips with resume do’s and don’ts and put them in a bowl or small box in the classroom.
• On the whiteboard or chalkboard, mark a line in the center and make two sections and name one part as “Do’s” and the other as “Don’ts”. 
• Call each student one by one and ask them to pick one chit and determine whether the point he/she discovered will come under do’s or don’ts. 
• Ask them to explain why they think the same and what should be done in that case. 

This activity will familiarize them with the technicalities that need to be taken care of while writing a resume and clear doubts about the whole process and exceptions. You can conduct this activity for both colleges as well as job applications. 

9. Anonymous messages

Who doesn’t like getting anonymous compliments and knowing about themselves? Well, this activity is all about getting insights about ourselves from other’s points of view. 

• Ask every student in the class to write about a minimum of five of their classmates on a slip of ½ size of a4 sheet. They can write for more friends if they want but the minimum is five. 
• They need to write the name of the friend they’re writing about then followed by strengths that they think their friend is good at which can be an asset to land a good job. Then write about the areas where they need to work on that can be added advantage for them while applying for jobs. 
• These chits will be anonymous feedback for the students. 
• Once done, collect all chits, mix them, and put them in a bowl. 
• Pick one chit one by one and read aloud about the student. 

This will encourage them, increase their self-esteem, provide insights that the students are unaware of about themselves, and can use them in their resumes and work on themselves. This self-esteem activity for high school students can work wonders in encouraging students to have belief & faith in themselves and their unique capabilities.

10. Build a Resume from Scratch

Let’s solve a puzzle and build a resume from scratch without having relatable skills, qualifications, and experiences to include. Sounds interesting, right? 

• Have different bowls or small boxes for every component of the resume like skills, qualifications, experience, the position of responsibility, etc. 
• Now, you can ask students or make different slips for every box by yourself. Each slip should have one thing like one slip with graphic designing for the box of skills. Make sure to have enough slips for every box so that every student can get at least 3-4 slips from each box. 
• Now every student has to come and pick 2-3 slips from each box. 
• After everyone is having their own set of slips, they need to design a resume based on the information they’ve got on the slips. They need to think of what qualifications, and skills can go together and how and create a good compelling resume. 

This activity is to equip students to carefully design and present everything in a resume when things are not so good and relatable enough. This activity will also help them in tailoring the resume according to a given job profile or college application.

High school students are at a point of transition to the colleges and workforce. This calls for developing resume writing skills to build compelling resumes. Besides instructing them about the process, engaging them in activities can have a profound impact on their learning.

Activities do not only teach them about the technicalities of resume building but also involve them in critical thinking, self-reflection, and collaboration. In addition to this, high school students can also participate in college readiness activities and transition activities to prepare themselves for their future endeavors.

Having a 10+ years of experience in teaching little budding learners, I am now working as a soft skills and IELTS trainers. Having spent my share of time with high schoolers, I understand their fears about the future. At the same time, my experience has helped me foster plenty of strategies that can make their 4 years of high school blissful. Furthermore, I have worked intensely on helping these young adults bloom into successful adults by training them for their dream colleges. Through my blogs, I intend to help parents, educators and students in making these years joyful and prosperous.

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How to teach resume writing to your high school students

If we are teaching our students how to write literary analysis essays about the symbolism of the green light in The Great Gatsby, then we also should be teaching our students how to write effective resumes that will get them jobs. In fact, I think the latter is more important, and I say this as a teacher who is obsessed with Gatsby. (Just stalk my Instagram.) But I’m not trying to call you out or shame you for not teaching resume writing in your English class. I actually never taught resumes until this year, when I was tasked with the responsibility of teaching a new senior English Elective, “Technical Communication.” After taking on this class and teaching resumes, I am wholeheartedly convinced that every single student should be required to create a resume before graduating high school.

Teaching resume writing was not an easy task for me or my students, but we learned a lot in the process. Drafting a resume is about more than practicing “real life” writing or becoming an employable job candidate. It’s about growing as a human being. Writing a resume requires introspection, self-awareness, and reflection. Throughout the process, students wrestled with the questions “Who am I?” and “How can I represent what I have to offer on a mere piece of paper?” This unit was challenging but rewarding, for me and my students.

Initially, I was intimidated by teaching resumes, because unlike the Gatsby essay that would be turned in and graded by me, these resumes would be printed out and sent off into the “real world” someday. The thought of teaching students how to write and design a document that could end up on the desk…or in the paper shredder…of a hiring manager was a bit daunting. Although I was nervous, I was excited about empowering my students and teaching what I knew would be one of the most relevant and valuable units I’ve ever taught.

Thankfully, I was right. By the end of our resume writing unit, I was so proud of how much my students had grown as writers, future job candidates, and most importantly, human beings. If you’re hoping to implement the same kind of learning experience for your students, check out my resume writing unit, which contains editable versions of all of my mini-lessons and resources. Here’s everything I learned about how to structure a helpful resume writing unit for your students:

1. Expose the students to lots of resumes: the good, the bad, and the ugly

At first, I didn’t know how to start our resume writing unit. Jump in to the writing process and revise later? Start with a mini-lesson? Honestly, I was stressed out and doubting my ability to teach resumes. I hadn’t interviewed for a job or touched my resume in 5 years. I felt like I was in over my head. What did I know?

In an effort to begin my unit and lesson planning, I started researching resumes. I found myself searching examples and taking mental note of what I noticed. Then it hit me: That’s what my students needed to do! Like me, they would be overwhelmed with the daunting task of creating an appealing, modern resume. Suddenly, my lesson plan for the next day was simple: Find tons of examples: the good, the bad, and the ugly. Let students sift through them and record their observations about what makes an effective resume–student-centered, inquiry-based learning!

I quickly rounded up sample resumes from Google, pulled up my old (and ugly) resume, and asked friends on Facebook to share their resumes. Within 20 minutes, I had a nice collection of over 20 resumes to share with my students. I printed off a few copies of each and arranged them on the counter in the back of my classroom.

Then, I created a worksheet where students simply recorded what they noticed about each resume. I gave them a few categories to focus on and asked them to critique each resume. I told students to pretend they were hiring managers going through stacks of resumes, deciding which candidates deserved an interview. After examining multiple resumes, students had to synthesize what they noticed about the most effective resumes. Finally, they reflected on what they already knew about resumes and what they wanted to learn and focus on throughout our mini unit.

This lesson was so simple, but so valuable. Some of them were harsh critics, which was great! Afterwards, I told them, “Gotcha! Now I have higher expectations because now you KNOW what to do! The only excuse is laziness!” If they critiqued the ugly fonts on the sample resumes…I could critic their font choice when I graded their final resumes with my rubrics. Mission accomplished!

2. Model the process with your own resume

After the results of the resume critique activity, I knew I needed to model the resume writing and design process by updating my own resume. My students were right. My resume was 2 pages long, filled with way too much text, and just plain ugly and uninspiring.

So before I began my mini-lessons on resume writing, I sat down to “teach myself” before I taught my students. I redesigned my entire resume, deleted irrelevant jobs, cut the fluff, and improved my word choice. This process gave me some confidence about teaching resumes for the first time, and it helped me realize what I should focus on during writing workshop with my students. During mini-lessons, I used my resume as an example. My students appreciated my transparency and learned a lot from my “before and after.”

Even though you might not need to update your resume, it’s a great exercise that will help you better understand the process and allow your students to see an “expert” model revision.

3. Scaffold the writing process with mini-lessons & a resume outline

When I revised and redesigned my own resume, I remembered how laborious it is to create an effective, visually-appealing resume. To make the resume writing process less daunting for my students, I broke up the different sections of the resume into different mini-lessons. I also created a resume outline on Google docs, and I required students to draft everything in the outline before they even touched a template. Students drafted and revised multiple times until I “approved” their working outline and allowed them to begin their final draft. This outline document scaffolded the structure and formatting of the resume, and it also helped me break down my mini-lessons. Here’s how I set up my mini-lessons during writing workshop:

• Writing a Professional Profile (If you’re new to the resume writing game, this is what has taken the place of the “Objective” section).
• Outlining Employment & Using Powerful Action Verbs
• Listing Skills & Using Strong Adjectives

I also incorporated peer feedback and teacher feedback activities in addition to the above mini-lessons.

4. Provide resources and support throughout the process

Since all of my students were creating resumes for different types of jobs, I knew I needed to offer even more scaffolding and support. A resume for an aspiring esthetician is going to look a lot different from a resume for an automotive technician! To support students and give them access to even more resources and examples, I created a hyperdoc of resources and links. Some of these resources were my own, but others were links from helpful websites that provided samples of resumes for different careers! If you want more information on creating your own hyperdocs for your students, check out this blog post.

Another way I provided support throughout the writing process was by checking in with every student, every day. On most days, I was able to walk around the room and physically check in with each student, but on days when I ended up helping a handful of students for a while, I didn’t make it to everyone. To make sure that I had a way of checking in on every student, no matter what, I had students submit an exit ticket at the end of each day. Each exit ticket was the same: “What did you accomplish today? What questions do you have and how can I help you?” I did this through Google Classroom’s “question” feature, so I was able to respond to students’ questions and see what everyone needed during the next day of writing workshop.

5. Incorporate multiple opportunities for peer feedback

Here’s the way I see peer feedback: The more you can train your students to provide feedback, the more efficient you can be with your teacher feedback. During our resume writing unit, I incorporated peer feedback in a variety of ways. First, I had students “turn and talk” to each other to give a “personal sales pitch” that would then become their professional profile at the top of their resume. Then, once they had drafted their profile and posted it on Google Classroom, I asked them to provide feedback to 3 of their peers. That way, once I looked at their professional profile drafts, their peers had already addressed a lot of what I would have commented, anyways! This allowed me to give my students more specific, focused feedback (and it saved me time, too).

The writing process can feel time-consuming, tedious, and boring for students. Mixing it up with opportunities for them to talk about their writing helps with engagement, too.

6. Emphasize the process of revision

It’s important to emphasize the process of revision and how it’s different from proofreading and editing. Some of them wanted to crank out their resumes, click “Turn in,” and then cheerfully shout, “I’m done!” when they hadn’t taken the time to genuinely revise. Other students argued that their resumes were “good enough” because they had successfully used them when applying for their current jobs. It was difficult to convince some students to invest time in the revision and editing.

But I’ll let you in on a little secret: Some of the students who struggled or complained the most were the very same ones who thanked me later in their learning reflections. Here’s what one student said: “The resume unit was the most helpful because I was too lazy to write one on my own. Miss G, you’re killing it.” At least they’re honest.

By structuring the resume-writing process with step-by-step lessons, modeling my own revision, and incorporating lots of peer and teacher feedback and subsequent revision, I forced my students to revise. I demonstrated the value of revision and purposefully integrated revision in my mini-lessons. I even included a category titled “Evidence of Revision” on my final rubric, and I asked students to explicitly tell me (through Google docs comments) what they revised and why. The end result? Better resumes, but more importantly, better writers who finally valued the process of revision.

7. Provide templates to help your students create a visually appealing, modern resume

It’s easy to let your students create the standard text-on-a-page resume, but it’s 2019, and those resumes are ancient! There are tons of options and templates available online, but my favorite resource for visually appealing resumes is Canva, a online graphic-design tool with many free templates. You can also search on Pinterest for more inspiration!

I designed two of my own templates and provided them to students, but I also linked up a few templates I found online. Most of my students used my templates or the ones from Canva, but I did have a few students who used other sources. I would recommend assessing how much structure your students need and then recommending different templates and/or websites. For example, for my ELL students, my pre-made template was especially helpful. I didn’t want them to be overwhelmed by the process of creatively designing a resume, because the process of writing was already challenging enough. Meet your students where they are, but use templates to help them create a visually appealing resume!

8. Make it meaningful & “publish” students’ final resumes!

English teachers know that one of the most important but often ignored parts of the writing process is the final phase: Publishing! When your students are finished, print their resumes out and celebrate their hard work in an authentic way. Here are a few ideas:

• Facilitate a “gallery walk” or “exhibit hall” where students “network” with their peers, exchange resumes, and discuss their experiences and skills.
• Facilitate mock interviews where students must discuss their resume and answer other common interview questions. (We did this & it was a hit with students!)
• Send off the resumes to administration or an hiring manager (if you can find one) and ask them to provide realistic feedback.
• Encourage students to use their new resumes to apply for a job, and then celebrate when they are successful!

I was so proud of my students’ final resumes and how much they grew during the writing process. The unit was not without its challenges, but it was so rewarding to end it with physical proof that students were one step closer to being “college and career ready.” If you’re interested in preparing your students for life after graduation, check out my Career Readiness Growing Bundle, which currently contains a career research project and this resume writing unit. (Cover letters and mock interviews are coming soon.)

Do you teach resume writing to your students? If so, what grade level and class? What other ideas or tips do you have? I would love to hear more in the comments!

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Thanks for the great resources. I plan on beginning my employment package assignment in April and this will come in handy. However, there is something that I want to point out. As a business professor who teaches business classes and resume writing, I would suggest telling your students that creative and fun resumes are only appropriate in that type of field such as graphic designs, creative writing, art, etc. In fields such as marketing, medicine, engineering, management, etc., creative resumes with various designs is a no-no. Granted these are high school students, but what we teach them now as a foundation on what they need to know should be practical for future referencing. Yes, the resume is a boring looking document, but how you teach it can be the creative and exciting part!

I will definitely be using these resources this year. Thank you for all you do.

Hi there, Thanks for your feedback. I do teach them about that. However, even the “boring” resumes look more professional with some fonts/lines/boxes/formatting/etc.

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