Careers thinking at the age of 7?

[kyliekaw]

Are the ages of 5-10 too early to introduce/build on the topic of careers with my children? My kids are learning about different professions at a basic level as part of a new school curriculum and I'm a bit worried they are going to get swayed to a job just because it sounds cool. Whats your guys thoughts?

Are your 5-10 y/o interested in learning about careers?

It's looking valuble opportunity to challenge gender stereotypes. My ds had asked me why we weren't a normal family (we have some challenges that impact on daily life). What he ment was why did I have a paid job instead of only doing domestic work!

My 6 year old doesn’t want a career. Is happy to live with forever as long as they can have a dog.

But pushing them towards a 'career' at such a young age is not learning about jobs.
Nobody is doing that.

They do learn about them, that's why so many children want to be a nurse, firefighter or whatever seems interesting to them at the time.
They learn about them from what they see around them. Children will talk about jobs they are familiar with which is why they talk about being a teacher, nurse etc because they have a limited knowledge about what jobs exist.

Worrying about them being swayed a certain way and trying to push for a certain type of career as a child is ridiculous.

But nobody is doing this. There is literally nothing in the suggested careers education curriculum at any age which pushes young people into a certain type of career.

How many boys want to be policemen or footballers? How many actually become that? A small minority.

Exactly! How many BOYS.... this is exactly why careers education should start early as at this age it's about challenging stereotypes and understanding how jobs fit into society.

Let them be children and not talk to them about being lawyers, accountants or estate agents. Let them enjoy dreaming.

Again, this isn't happening. It might help if you made yourself familiar with what actually happens before you criticise it 🙄

@GCSister

and I'm a bit worried they are going to get swayed to a job just because it sounds cool. *
*
From OPs post - so yes, it is happening. I used boys just as an example, but nothing on OPs post was about sexism or inequality. I agree that girls can just as much want to be a footballer or policewoman. But these stereotypes still do exist, particularly at age 5-7. They do usually figure it out as they get older!

I don’t consciously other than to say things like ‘woooow look at that lighting (on strictly come dancing for example) - that’s someone’s JOB! How cool would that be??’ or if we go to local gardens I point out that must be a nice job etc. He loves maths and history and sports so we talk about things he could do with that, but he brings up the topic, not me.

I’m going to encourage them to think about the lifestyle they want first (outside all day? Surrounded by others or peaceful? Exercise as part of your job? Easy 9-5 you don’t bring home with you? Loads of travel? Absolutely minted?) then find a job that would allow for that.

Believe me, this is my job. I train people to deliver careers education across all ages and I know for a fact that schools aren't trying to persuade young people (particularly primary age children ) to enter certain professions. I think the OP is making some big assumptions there.
If the school is doing that they it's goes against the professional code of ethics.

As for people suddenly forgetting about stereotypes when they get older..... hahaha nope. That doesn't happen.
Try it yourself, ask people to tell you who the visualise when you say doctor, the vast majority of adults will describe a man. Then see what happens when you do the same for nurse ....

@GCSister no, I read it that the parents are pushing the career issue - nothing to do with schools!
As to stereotypes, yes they will always exist, but I meant that children realise that they can be a female doctor, or a male nurse as they get older.

I think it's worth helping children to understand that the aim of their education will eventually be to help them find the right career, but it's important when telling them about specific kinds of job than there are hundreds of millions of different jobs and they should never limit their ambitions to the small number that they know about so far. Some of the most interesting and exciting jobs that a 25 year old might be doing in 18 years time simply don't exist yet as the technology that will invent those jobs won't be invented for another 5-10 years. Other jobs that they do find out about may no longer exist or may be radically changed by the time they are an adult so using specific examples of different careers is fine to illustrate the important point that there's a huge variety of different jobs and different people have different skills so getting to understand yourself and what kinds of things you are good at (or want to get good at) is valuable, but encourage childred not to be fixated on one definite career choice so much as a broad category of types of job that they might be interested in and are expecting to learn more in a few years time, gradually narrowing from that broad area every few years as their understanding of their own skills and potential increases

The OP clearly states that her children are learning about careers in school.

The stereotype issue really isn't that simplex

Most of the jobs they will do won’t even exist yet.

Exactly. Which is why careers education isn't really about teaching people about jobs.

When my dc were in y1/2 parents who had a career were invited into school to talk about their jobs so experienced a variety of occupations and have done so all through their education since.
I distinctly remember dc2 coming home and saying he'd be a radiologist because they can xray toys hes now looking at economics. Dc1 is at uni doing a hcp role but wanted to be a train driver like his friends dad. Dc3 wanted to be a nurse until many years later she realised that it meant wiping people's bums and now wants to be a historian.
They'll change their minds many times before they get there I've always found it opens their eyes to variety of jobs. My gripe is with ks4 (at our school anyway) when if they don't want to go down the route of conventional alevels /uni they are not given as much support and are left to their own devices.

My brother wanted to push the trolleys in sainsburys - his a director of a company now, not sainsburys!

Introduce them to jobs, bigger variety the better but careers isn't necessary.

i remember getting into conversations when the kids were younger about‘what you want to be’ and I actually hugely regret it- we were led towards college but now my eldest is AMAZING at woodworking in school and talks all the time about everything wood related and if he ends up going towards the things I was leading him towards I’d be gutted! Also as parents we forget how wide the world is and how many careers there are, personally I think it’s their education and life experience that will tell them what they want to be.

Of my three that are now adults one is at Uni and wants to do what she has done since she was 5 - teaching.

DS has changed his mind though as he was adamant at 5 he was going to own a McDonald’s that only sold chicken nugget happy meals and adult chicken nugget meals. Nothing else at all 😂

@EduCated yes, I see what you mean! OP, four threads in one evening on the same topic? This feels like market research!

Absolutely. I went to school in the 80s. Always wanted to be a writer but couldn't see how I could ever do it. Years later the internet came along and that's how I made it work. Oh, and another young member of the family (aged around 6 I think) was adamant he wanted to be a skeleton when he grew up.

He ended up doing something else entirely eventually 😁

It's part of the curriculum to look at professions. It's just 'understanding of the world'. Surely all 4 year olds want to be spiderman and by 7 I'm fairly sure it's changed. By 14 it'll be different and by the time the leave school or Uni they will be applying to what they can realistically get.

I only know a couple of people (out of several hundred) who knew what they wanted to do when they were 18 (medic, architect) so I really wouldn't stress about this. I'm sure there must be plenty of other things you can worry about.

My DDs are now 28, 24 and 21. When DD28 was 7 all she wanted to be was a famous actress. She's now a policy advisor in Westminster. Dd24 wanted to be a guard dog - now an engineer. Dd21 wanted to be a cleaner. She's still at uni, but heading for a masters in entomology and a research career.

Not too early to talk about jobs but don't expect them to end up doing what they say at 7.

My 7 year old wanted to be a pirate or a footballer. At 7 , I wanted to be a teacher and that’s what I did.

No child in school will feel pushed to be an accountant or doctor or plumber. In fact, learning about different careers might give them the chance to dream about something else (even if it doesn't last). On the opposite end of the spectrum are children who come from families with no profession in the family, and no role model career-wise. It's just as important for them to learn there are a whole range of interesting jobs, whether they go after a specific one or not.

My son wanted to be a knight at 6. Explained not much call for them these days. So he said ok he'll be a Jedi!
Sure talk about it but what they might think they want to be at that age will change 100 times!

My 7 year old is going to have 5 children (one set of twins and one set of triplets) and 5 cats and being an artist-vet-astronomer. I've just nodded and smiled so far. My older daughter wanted to be the large snowman from Frozen at the same age, then an architect, she's now planning on joining the navy. I really don't think it matters. I don't have a career just a series of different jobs, I don't think it matters really.

At 7 or 8 I decided I anted to be a history teacher - and I am!!!