Daily Learning Contract
- Topic: Resilience and Labor-Market Evidence
- Objective: Students will plan a specific response to a failed technology test and analyze labor-market evidence for three IT careers without mixing unlike salary measures.
- TEKS: d(1)(C), d(5)(A), d(5)(E)
- Demonstration of Learning: Four-row Flip the Failure chart, pages 1-4 of the three-career salary packet, and one claim supported by a labeled number.
Lesson Overview
| Time | 50 minutes |
| Objectives | Plan a cybersecurity team's bounce-back after a failed test; compare three IT careers while keeping HQIM local figures and external national figures separately labeled; complete the IT Salary Comparison worksheet |
| TEKS | d(1)(C), d(5)(A), d(5)(E) |
| 5E Phases | Engage: Warm-Up · Explore: Flip the Failure chart and the BLS salary comparison · Explain: Share and Compare partner talk · Evaluate: Exit Ticket |
| Deliverable | Four-row Flip the Failure chart, four BLS fields added to each Day 2 career record, and the page 4 comparison |
| Materials | Find Your Future workbook pp. 26-27, each student's Day 2 salary packet, Chromebooks, BLS Computer/IT pages, and, for students who need them, the BLS data extraction guide (Printable PDF) and pre-filled Flip the Failure chart (Printable PDF), projector |
Before Students Arrive
- Open FYF pp. 26-27, the fixed Software Developer and Web Developer BLS pages, and the BLS IT index for each student's third career. Return each student's Day 2 salary packet.
- Do not print a second whole-class packet. Print the evidence model, bilingual headers, extraction guide, and prefilled resilience row only for students who use them.
- Flip the Failure stays in the FYF workbook. Do not print a second whole-class chart.
- Set one class tray or named digital folder for holding the salary packet until Day 5. If time slips, use page 4 of the packet as the DOL and skip the separate comparison-matrix exit rather than making students copy the same three numbers twice.
Warm-Up (5 min)
WARM-UP: Think about a time you practiced hard or worked hard on something and it still flopped. What did you do right after it happened?
Quick share. Most students will name quitting, blaming, or trying again with no plan. Bridge: "Today you are the team leader when a security system fails its big test. Your job is not to feel bad about it. Your job is to figure out the next move."
Activity 1: Powerskill Resilience — Flip the Failure (13 min)
Source: (FYF pp. 26-27: "Powerskill: Resilience")
Open the workbook to page 26. Read the definition together: resilience is the ability to bounce back after a setback. Resilient people do not give up. They hit pause, figure out what went wrong, and ask what they can try differently next time.
Step 1: Read the Scenario (p. 26). Students are the team leader of a cybersecurity group. The team spent months building a system to stop hackers. Today is test day and the system did not work as expected. Half the team played the hackers, half watched the system, and four things went wrong:
- The alert system was too slow. The warning did not reach the team until the hackers had been inside the network for 15 minutes, and by then top-secret files were gone.
- One password system was never updated. Running on old software, it let hackers in with guesses like "admin123."
- Test results were misread. A warning flashed early in the test, someone decided it was a glitch, and brushing it off left a hole in the security wall.
- Communication broke down. Everyone panicked and talked over each other, and nobody knew whose job it was to press the stop button.
The page also describes a frozen laptop, a phone full of notifications, and a loud printer. Point out that the workbook calls these annoying but not the main problem, and ask students which of the four items above is the real problem instead.
Step 2: Flip the Failure (p. 27). Students fill the three-column chart in their workbook. Column 1 is the What Went Wrong item, column 2 is Bounce Back Ideas (how do we fix the problem?), and column 3 is Tips for the Team to Stay Resilient. All four rows get filled.
Keep the language support beside the chart: update, assign, test, alert, pause, check, communicate. A complete response frame is: "Next time, the _ should by __ so that _____."
Step 3: Share and Compare (p. 27). Think-Pair-Share: 30 seconds of silent Think on the workbook's own question, how focusing on solutions instead of mistakes shows resilience, then Partner A reads one row for 30 seconds and Partner B reads a different row for 30 seconds. Partners name one place their charts agree and one place they differ. Two pairs share with the class.
Facilitation Tip
The most common student answer in column 2 is "work harder." Push for a fix a team could actually schedule: set the alert to fire in under a minute, put software updates on a calendar, write down who presses stop. If a student cannot name who does the fix and when, the idea is not a bounce back plan yet.
Activity 2: BLS Cross-Reference + Salary Comparison Worksheet (22 min)
Sources: Hats & Ladders or Xello for the district-adopted localized HQIM figure; BLS for a separately labeled national cross-check
Open with a 60-second prediction before anyone touches a Chromebook: do all programming jobs pay the same, and which one might pay the most? Students record the prediction in the page 4 margin and check it after the cross-check.
Students keep the same three careers they chose on Day 2. The HQIM localized salary evidence should already be complete. Today they add the BLS national cross-check without replacing or recopying the HQIM section.
Direct students to the BLS pages for their 3 chosen careers:
- Software Developers: bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/software-developers.htm
- Web Developers: bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/web-developers.htm
- (Their choice): browse bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/home.htm
Chunking: Teach the four BLS fields one at a time on the projector with the evidence-label model (Printable PDF). Say what each field is for before showing where it lives on the BLS page, and take a quick thumbs check after each field before releasing the next one. Students who need the walkthrough in front of them work from the BLS data extraction guide (Printable PDF). For each BLS page, students find only:
- BLS occupation title
- Median Pay and data year (national; located in the Quick Facts box at the top)
- Typical Entry-Level Education
- Job Outlook percent and projection years
Students add those four BLS fields to pages 1-3 of the packet they started yesterday:
| Field | Career 1 | Career 2 | Career 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| BLS occupation title | |||
| National median + data year | |||
| Typical entry education | |||
| Outlook percent + projection years |
Page 4 carries the comparison and prediction check. Do not add jobs/openings, employer research, a duplicate job description, or a separate source-difference paragraph. Collect pages 1-4 together; page 5 stays blank until the Day 5 Career Fit Reflection.
DOK 3: What conclusions can you draw about the relationship between education level and salary for IT careers in the DFW area? Is more education ALWAYS worth it?
Facilitation Tip
The most common student mistake is treating starting pay, a range, and a median as interchangeable. Teach the labels, then keep both figures in their own columns. A difference between H&L or Xello and BLS is a comparison question, not a reason to overwrite one source with the other.
CFU and pivot: After each field, students show thumbs up, side, or down for whether they can locate it. The first lap checks BLS occupation title, then median and year. If more than one quarter of the class mixes annual/hourly, range/median, or outlook percent/years, stop and repair one row with the supplied evidence-label model before continuing.
Comparison DOL (7 min)
Page 4 of the salary packet is the default DOL. Students use two comparable facts to make one career recommendation and preserve the source labels.
Keep these words beside the response: localized, national, range, median, outlook, percentage, source. A complete frame is: "I choose _ because BLS shows % growth from to _. The HQIM shows as a for _____, so I kept the two measures separate."
Use the separate matrix below only when it gives the teacher useful additional evidence. Do not require both routes by default.
EXIT TICKET (Comparison Matrix) · Printable PDF:
Use your IT Salary Comparison worksheet to fill in the matrix below.
| Career 1: ___ | Career 2: ___ | Career 3: ___ | |
|---|---|---|---|
| BLS national median pay | |||
| Typical entry-level education | |||
| Job growth rate (BLS) |
Bottom line: Which of your three careers has the BEST combination of HIGH salary AND FAST growth? Name it, then in one sentence use a specific number from the matrix to back your choice. (d(5)(A), d(5)(E))
Collect and Close (3 min)
Students turn the five-page packet into the class tray or named digital folder. The teacher returns the same packet on Day 5 for the Career Fit Reflection.
Access and Recovery
- Absent today: Use the embedded failed-test images, the Day 2 HQIM records, and the fixed career card inside the BLS guide to complete the same four-row chart and pages 1-4. Do not assign a replacement worksheet.
- Live source unavailable: Use the fixed career card in the BLS guide and keep the source/date visible. The evidence job does not change.
- Day 2 packet also missing: Give the student the career model and supervised catch-up route. The student should not invent a salary, preparation requirement, or outlook figure.
Differentiation
- Support: Place the evidence-label model beside the student's packet (Printable PDF); it shows how to preserve title, geography, measure, source, and date without replacing the student's own data. For Flip the Failure, use the pre-printed chart with row 1 ("The alert system was too slow") already filled in (Printable PDF) so students complete the remaining three rows. Pair either one with the BLS data extraction guide (Printable PDF).
- Extension: Students compare their 3 DFW IT careers to the same 3 careers in San Francisco. The salaries are higher in SF, but cost of living is much higher too. Discuss: which is actually a better deal?
- ELL: Bilingual worksheet headers (Career = Carrera, Salary = Salario, Education = Educación, Growth = Crecimiento) on the Spanish-header version of the sheet (Printable PDF). Allow ELL students to use the BLS pages in their preferred language via browser translation. Read the four scenario failures aloud before students start the chart, and offer the stem "Next time the team should _ so that (La próxima vez el equipo debe __ para que _____)."