TruSpark Career Assessment for Teens

If you’re like me, one of your biggest struggles with homeschooling (and parenting in general) is hoping you’re making the right decisions for what your kids need to be successful in life. I’m constantly watching my kids and trying to understand them in order to choose the right curriculum, adjust according to their learning style, and make educated guesses about their future to prepare them for it. S0, I know you’ll be thrilled to learn all about the TruSpark Career Assessment for Teens today and how it will help you understand your kids better so you can make better informed decisions!

Disclosure: This is a sponsored post. I was compensated for my time reviewing this product, writing this review, and hosting the giveaway.

What is TruSpark?

In a quick nutshell, TruSpark is an online assessment that takes your student through a series of exercises to help them learn about their core motivations and give them some ideas of career paths they might want to follow. There is also an included online curriculum to help them learn more about core motivations in general.

TruSpark describes their assessment this way:

“Discover your top 3 motivations and then connect those motivations to career options! TruSpark is a story-based online assessment for mid- and early-teens that uncovers the intrinsic drives which propel our likes and dislikes.”

Who is TruSpark for?

TruSpark was created for teens, and specifically those around 13 to 16 years old. I used it myself, though, and thoroughly enjoyed the exercise. And, when I told my husband about it, he wished I had another “credit” so he could take it, too!

How We Used TruSpark

I had 4 assessment credits. I kept one for myself and assigned the others to these students: T (age 15), L (age 13), and I (age 11).

Everything is laid out very nicely on the TruSpark website. It was extremely easy to assign a student to an assessment. I even had to switch a student since one wasn’t able to complete it in time, and it was even simple to “unassign” her and add another in her place.

When you assign a student, you enter their email address and TruSpark sends them a direct link so they can do the assessment on their own. It was very user-friendly and worked great.

Click here to head to TruSpark!

What is in the TruSpark Career Assessment for Teens?

Based on over 60 years of research, the TruSpark assessment which was once used for adults has been reworked for teens. It’s a fun online quiz that takes about 15-20 minutes to complete. My 13- and 15-year-olds had no trouble doing it by themselves, and I helped my 11-year-old go through it.

 

First, you think of a “story,” a time in your life when you did something that you felt really good about. You type that out in one to two sentences. They give you tips on what to include to make it a “good” story and what not to include (such as not picking something just to impress others and not worrying about whether others might think it’s ordinary or mundane).

Then, the assessment gives you a list of phrases that you make decisions about. After that, you rank those phrases, narrowing down your core motivations.

 

After completing it once, you’ll do the exact same thing for a second “story” or time you did something that you felt really good about.

Then, you rank the stories, and they come up with your results, which you can read more about, print, and/or share!

 

What is the TruSpark Career Exploration Curriculum?

Before taking the assessment, TruSpark recommends doing some of the online assessment to learn a bit more about core motivations, the purpose of the assessment, and how the results can be used. I went through some of it with my 11-year-old. It’s fun to do, with cartoons–not just reading dry paragraphs.

There are 3 levels to the curriculum:

• 1: Core Motivations (45 minutes)
• 2: Career Exploration (90 minutes)
• 3: Live Out Your Purpose (90 minutes)

TruSpark provides a 5-page Journal that the student can write and brainstorm on as they’re going through the curriculum.

 

How to Use the TruSpark Career Exploration Results

Here are the results we received.

I was The Maximizer, The Overcomer, and The Expert. Look at my first four possible occupations. I think they got it right since I do all of those!

T (age 15) was The Learner, The Explorer, and The Finisher.

L (age 13) was The Overcomer, The Learner, and The Visionary.

I (age 11) was The Learner, The Improver, and The Overcomer.

So, first of all, it’s helpful for me to recognize that none of my kids are like me! My 15-year-old doesn’t even have any core motivations the same as mine. This is so fascinating. I’ve always been interested in personality tests and others such as the 5 love languages, but TruSpark focuses on a whole new area.

Understanding the Core Motivations will help my kids make better decisions about high school classes to take, college major to choose, and career choice! We will come back to these results again and again over the next few years to make sure I’m helping my student make the best decisions for him or herself!

What I Liked About TruSpark

The results truly helped me understand my teens better. And, I know it helped them gain more self awareness and even self acceptance, too!

I love that it’s not just a “one and done” tool. We will work on finishing the career exploration curriculum, most likely as a family together during our homeschool morning time, and we’ll head back to review their assessment results often!

An example for one of the occupations:

 

One thing that is nice about the assessment is that only the results will be shared. The parent won’t see the teen’s stories or rankings of motivational phrases. This gives the teen more freedom to be honest and not to choose a story or an answer just because he or she wants to please their parent.

I decided to do the TruSpark assessment with my 11-year-old rather than having him do it on his own since he fell below the age that TruSpark said it was written for. And, I agree with TruSpark that the assessment and curriculum are best for ages 13 and up. It was a little difficult for my 11-year-old to decide on a story and rank the motivations without my help explaining things to him.

My Video Review

Suggestion for Improvement

The only suggestion I have for improving TruSpark would be to include an option to have the words on the screen read aloud to the students. I have a daughter with dyslexia (who didn’t take the assessment), and I know this would be a valuable feature for her in both the assessment and the curriculum.

Still Have Questions about TruSpark?

Check out the TruSpark FAQ page here to see a sample of the curriculum, learn more about how the assessment works, how TruSpark chooses jobs/careers, and how accurate the results are.

 

Related Posts:

• No Busywork Literature Guides that Don’t Kill the Book
• 50 Screen-Free Activities for Teens
• Selling on Etsy Masterclass for Teens
• Hamilton the Musical Projects for Teens