When it’s time for students to start working or head to college, they’ll need “soft skills,” otherwise known as career-readiness or job-readiness skills, in addition to academic knowledge and vocational skills. Try some of these fun and easy job-readiness activities to help build soft skills for high school students starting out in the world.
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What Are Soft Skills?
Soft skills are characteristics that help you function as an individual (motivation, self-confidence, flexibility) as well as within a group (teamwork, negotiation, respect). These job-readiness skills are key for succeeding in the workplace. After all, if you can’t show up on time, speak up for yourself, or get along with your peers, chances are you’re not going to have a very smooth go of it.
Check out the video below to learn more about soft skills. Then check out the activities below.
Explicitly teaching students these job-readiness skills is the best way to give them valuable insight into their strengths and weaknesses. We’ve rounded up 50 engaging activities, organized by skills, that are not only just right for teaching the job-readiness skills students need, they are also a lot of fun!
Communication Skills Job-Readiness Activities
Listen and Recap
Divide your class into partners. One student will be the talker and the other the listener. The talker will tell a short story or answer a prompt. When they are finished, the listener will summarize the key points to show they listened carefully and understood what the talker said.
Role-Play Conversations
You know what they say: Practice makes perfect. Have students practice skills such as introducing themselves, asking for help, or resolving a misunderstanding. These skills will not only help them get along in the classroom but also in future careers.
Back-to-Back Drawing
Partner kids up and have them stand or sit back-to-back. Hand out pictures to one student in each pair. One student will describe the image while the other draws it (without seeing it). This activity is terrific for building clear verbal communication skills and excellent listening skills.
Impromptu Storytelling Challenges
Speaking on the fly can be nerve-wracking. But with a little practice, kids can gain the confidence they’ll need to perform well in college or on the job. Prepare a stack of random topic cards, then challenge students to give a 1–2-minute talk on that topic to build their confidence and speaking skills.
Poetry Slam
Slam poetry is a unique performance art that will not only give your students the opportunity to express their thoughts but build their confidence as well. Slam poems are specifically written to be performed in front of an audience, and topics are often diverse, political, and thought-provoking. Finding your voice and being able to move people with your words are job-readiness skills that can apply to any future endeavor.
Learn more: 25 Slam Poetry Examples (Plus Explanation and History)
Mini Debates
Create a safe, supportive environment in your classroom for students to explore voicing their opinions. Use engaging, age-appropriate prompts like “Should phones be banned in class?” or “Is a college education worth the investment?” to help teach them respectful discussion and persuasive speaking.
Mock Interviews
Have kids pair up and conduct interviews for jobs like babysitter, camp counselor, or fast-food restaurant worker. Emphasize the importance of a confident handshake, steady eye contact, and coherent, comprehensive answers to questions.
Elevator Pitch Challenge
Being able to deliver a concise, effective summary in a short amount of time is a skill that will take students far in life. Teach them the basics of a pitch, then give them time to practice delivering a 30-second “pitch” about themselves, a product, or an idea to sharpen delivery and confidence.
Customer Role-Play
Role-play is a powerful tool to build confidence. Set up a pretend shop or cafe where kids take orders, make “sales,” and handle customer service. Or have students run a school store or manage the classroom currency system.
Teamwork and Collaboration Skills Job-Readiness Activities
Group Problem-Solving
Working together to meet a goal takes patience and focus. Create scenarios in the classroom where students tackle challenges like building a bridge from limited materials or designing a classroom improvement plan.
Learn more: Awesome Team-Building Games and Activities for Kids
Rotating Roles
A successful organization relies on all of its players. Give every student in your classroom the opportunity to try on different roles by rotating them through positions such as leader, note-taker, and presenter to ensure everyone practices leadership and support roles.
Cooperative Games
While reading, writing, and math are essential skills to learn in school, learning to work with others is equally important. Indoor activities like building projects or scavenger hunts teach teamwork and shared decision-making. Outdoor games like Hula-Hoop passes and cooperative obstacle courses not only build collaborative skills, they’re super fun.
Learn more: 45 Cooperative Games To Promote Camaraderie and Healthy Competition
Critical Thinking and Creative Problem-Solving Job-Readiness Activities
Mystery Bag Challenge
Divide students into teams and give each team a random set of materials, like tape, paper clips, and cups. Next, challenge them to solve a creative problem, such as build something that moves, in an allotted period of time. After time expires, have each group share their creation.
Case Studies
Critical thinking is the ability to examine a subject and develop an informed opinion about it. It’s about asking questions, then looking closely at the answers to form conclusions that are backed by provable facts, not just “gut feelings” and opinion. Critical thinking is definitely on the top of most employers’ wish lists for new employees. Give students a feel for future scenarios by posing real-world problems, like “Our lemonade stand is losing money—what can we do?” Then have kids brainstorm fixes for the problem.
Escape Room Puzzles
Setting up a classroom escape room is a surefire way to increase student engagement and teach persistence and reasoning under pressure.
Learn more: How To Set Up and Run a Classroom Escape Room
“Shark Tank” Challenge
Encourage an entrepreneurial spirit in your students by setting up a mock Shark Tank competition. First, students (individuals, partners, or teams) will need to invent a product or service. Then they will create a short pitch and present it to classmates/judges to convince them their idea is worthy of investing in.
Design Challenges
Design challenges tap into students’ creativity and innovative thinking skills. They are fun and engaging, and most involve ordinary classroom supplies. Simply supply a set of random materials (paper clips, tape, string) and establish the goal (build the tallest tower, protect an egg, etc.).
Learn more: STEM Activities for Kids of All Ages and Interests
Innovation Project
It’s amazing the things kids can accomplish when they’re challenged. Why not introduce them to famous inventors and their accomplishments to spark their critical thinking skills? Then, encourage them to come up with an invention or app idea of their own that solves a real-world problem.
Learn more: Smart Invention Ideas and Activities to Inspire Innovative Kids
Imagineering Challenge
Creating items by repurposing or reimagining various materials like paper, plastic, textiles, and glass is a great way to stretch your students’ imaginations and innovative thinking skills. For example, convert plastic soda bottles into bird feeders or turn an old pair of jeans into a tote bag. Or take a familiar product and redesign it for a new purpose or audience.
Reverse Brainstorming
To use reverse brainstorming, first identify a problem and then flip it by asking “how can I make this problem worse?” For example, a problem like “How can I stop being late for school?” can be reversed to “How can I make sure I’m always late?” Ideas like hitting snooze, taking a long shower, or getting distracted by social media will come up. After listing the ways to make the problem worse, reverse those ideas to find solutions, like setting an earlier alarm, showering faster, and putting the phone away.
Time Management and Organization Job-Readiness Activities
Organize the Day
Divide students into groups. Then give each group a jumbled list of daily to-dos. The goal of the activity is to arrange the tasks into a logical, balanced schedule based on importance and the amount of time each task will take. Compare each group’s results to see how each prioritized the day’s tasks.
Weekly Job Chart
Classroom jobs are a great way to teach students responsibility and the importance of chipping in to take care of spaces they use. In addition, they give students a sense of ownership of their environment and teach valuable lessons about stewardship. Confer with your students about what jobs need to be done, then set up a system where students rotate through the jobs along with deadlines for finishing their tasks.
Personal Planner Practice
Teach students to use planners or digital tools to create a realistic schedule for the upcoming week, including classes, activities, and downtime. Have them set goals for the week, track their progress, and reflect on what helped or hindered them.
Learn more: Effective Time Management Strategies and Tools for Students
Goal Breakdown
Have students pick one big goal (for example, finish a research project). Then ask them to develop an action plan that breaks their goal down into smaller, attainable actions. Finally, use a calendar or planner to set dates for these actions to be accomplished. Once the project is complete, encourage students to review how closely they followed their action plan.
Event Planning
Have kids take the lead in planning a small event like a bake sale, class party, or fundraiser. Teach them how to sketch out a master plan, assign roles, create a timeline, and set deadlines.
Professionalism and Responsibility Job-Readiness Activities
Peer Feedback
Giving and receiving constructive criticism are difficult skills to acquire. Giving requires tact and finesse, and receiving calls for open-mindedness and trust. Incorporate activities into your weekly schedule that give students time to practice peer review.
Classroom Economy
A classroom economy is a great tool for creating a positive classroom community. Not only that, it can be a starting place for financial literacy learning. There are numerous systems out there, but the basic premise involves rewarding students points or tokens for positive behaviors like completing tasks, showing up on time, or helping classmates. Rewards for these earnings can include small prizes, school supplies, or privileges like being line leader or extra computer time. Establish your system, then gradually turn over responsibility for running it to your students, depending on their age.
Initiative
Basically, initiative means seeing what needs to be done and doing it without waiting for direction, and this ability will get you further than almost any other. Employers are looking for people who can hit the ground running. So, how do you teach this valuable skill? Start with examples of initiative in everyday life, for example, picking up trash without being asked or starting homework without being told. Then, discuss the difference between waiting for direction and acting responsibly without being asked. Finally, role-play what taking initiative would look like with scenarios like “Your team’s project is missing a key part and the teacher isn’t available—what could you do?”
Work Ethic
Work ethic involves showing reliability, persistence, and pride in one’s work. Build a foundation of these skills with students by recognizing and rewarding excellent work, effort, and behavior in your classroom. Read stories about successful people who stuck to the job even through trying times. Focus on work ethic as an intrinsic, not extrinsic, source of pride.
Digital and Career Skills Job-Readiness Activities
Resume or Portfolio Creation
A resume is an essential tool for getting a job and applying to college. Teach your students how to showcase their skills and accomplishments in an effective way. Start by having them create a “brag sheet” that lists achievements and skills. Then, show them different ways to create an online portfolio that organizes their information in a professional manner.
Online Etiquette Game
In today’s world, digital communication skills matter more than ever. What seems like a direct comment can unintentionally come off as abrupt and disrespectful. Discuss scenarios about email tone and online etiquette. In addition, teach students to carefully curate their digital footprints—future employers and professionals use these resources to research future candidates.
Career Exploration Stations
It’s so important to talk to teens about their plans for life after high school. And in our rapidly evolving world, the options seem endless. Set up activities that act as “job simulations” that coordinate with real-world opportunities such as budgeting like an accountant, coding a mini game on the computer, or creating an action plan like a project manager.
Learn more: Best Careers for the Future
Cybersecurity Awareness
With each advance in technology, there are bad players who are figuring out how to cheat the system. Teach students the importance of secure passwords, phishing, and safe browsing habits.
Leadership Skills Job-Readiness Activities
Classroom Committees
Involve your students in sharing the responsibility for running your classroom community by assigning them roles and rotating through various classroom committees. Ideas include attendance, classwork, cleanup, library, and supplies.
For more ideas: Inspiring Leadership Activities
Mentorship Buddies
Pair older students with younger students to practice mentoring. Learning to guide, listen, and encourage their little buddies will help them build valuable skills that will contribute to their future school and job success.
We all want our students to be independent, responsible, empathetic, and supportive. Service learning projects are a great way for students to develop these traits, so make it part of your curriculum. A great way to start is to encourage your students to identify a need in their school or community and plan a small action project to address it.
Learn more: What Is Service Learning?
Leadership Reflections
One characteristic of a great leader is self-reflection. After all, a leader can develop a plan and assign roles, but if people don’t buy into it or don’t implement it accurately, the results will fall short. Ask your students to reflect on a time when they took the initiative or helped others succeed, and what they learned about leadership. As a class, develop a list of leadership qualities from students’ insights.
Mission Possible
Divide students into teams and give them an open-ended challenge. For example, improve the school lunch experience or make mornings run smoother. Then, challenge teams to research, plan, and pitch a realistic solution.
Adaptability and Resilience Job-Readiness Activities
Change the Plan
Flexibility is a must in today’s fast-paced world. Rigid thinking will only result in frustration and ineffectiveness. To reinforce this principle, switch things up once in a while. Midway through an activity, change a rule or constraint so that students must pivot quickly. Ask students to reflect afterward on how they felt and how they would rate themselves on recalibrating midstream.
New Skill Challenge
We are all capable of so much more than we realize, but it’s easy to look at ourselves one-dimensionally. Declare a “Learn a New Skill Week” in your classroom. Have each student pick a skill they’ve never tried (coding, cooking, drawing, etc.) and at the end of the week share what they learned and how they would rate their learning curve.
Growth Mindset
Throughout history, some of our greatest innovators were met with tremendous setbacks. For instance, Thomas Edison had over 1,000 failed attempts at developing the light bulb and Walt Disney’s first production company went bankrupt. But with grit and perseverance, they went on to make great contributions to our culture and society. What they had in common was a growth mindset—the ability to be open to new ideas and processes and a belief in being able to succeed at anything with enough effort.
Learn more: Growth Mindset Activities To Inspire Confidence in Kids
Improvisation Game
Try this hilarious storytelling game to help students think creatively and learn to respond quickly to changing scenarios. Have students sit in a circle. The first player will come up with a beginning line for a story. The next person says, “Yes, and …,” and adds on the next line of the story. The next person does the same thing and so on until you get all the way around the circle. You’ll be surprised at the crazy twists and turns your students will come up with.
Reflection Circles
We all encounter bumps in the road in our lifetime. What matters is how you proceed afterward. Divide students into to small groups and ask them to share a challenging situation they have dealt with and explain how they handled setbacks and what strategies helped them bounce back.
Emotional Intelligence and Empathy Job-Readiness Activities
Social-Emotional Skills
The best way to set your students on the path to success in life is to infuse social-emotional learning into every aspect of your curriculum. No matter where they go in life, skills like self-awareness, responsible decision-making, and relationship skills will help them meet their goals as a responsible member of society.
Learn more: What Is Social Emotional Learning?
Feelings Charades
The key to handling emotions is to first identify them. This can be a challenging task, especially for younger students. But you can’t work peacefully with others if you are unable to put yourself in their shoes. Play a round of charades with your students using emotion cards. Have them act out the emotion while the other students guess what it is.
Kindness Chain
Share the love in your classroom community by establishing a kindness recognition protocol. Have a kindness jar where students can write down acts of kindness they witness. Or hold a compliment circle where each student gives a compliment to the person to their right all the way around the circle. Or have students write thank-you notes to helpful school staff.
Conflict Resolution Practice
In every aspect of life, some degree of conflict in inevitable. That’s why it’s so important to teach our kids constructive ways to deal with their feelings, communicate, and work toward resolutions. One method involves teaching kids to use “I” statements like “I feel ___ when ____ because ____.” Giving your students a chance to role-play using this technique will help them prepare for future squabbles.
Learn more: Ways To Help Kids Solve Their Own Problems
Perspective Swap
As the saying goes, there are two sides to every story. But sometimes, especially when you are young, it’s hard to see the other side. Try this: Present a conflict and have students pick a side. Then, have them write an argument from the other perspective. Taking the opposite point of view can help students build greater empathy and be more open-minded.
“What Would You Do?” Scenarios
One way to soften conflicts is to rehearse them ahead of time. Present a variety of ethical or workplace dilemmas, such as “What would you do if you knew someone was stealing?” or “How should you deal with a teammate who is always late?” Allow students time to think about the situation, then brainstorm possible solutions together.
Stress-Management Strategies
Healthy strategies help people manage anxiety, deadlines, and tough situations. These skills are essential not only in high school but in higher education and in practically every job out there.
Learn more: Empowering Mental Health Activities for Teens
If you liked these ideas that reinforce job-readiness skills, get our free Career Exploration lesson plans and handouts!
