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Notes for teachers or adults

These instructions in PDF format and only intended for teachers can be found here.

We suggest this project is done by students between the age of 13 and 18. This is an individual project and can be done at home or by individuals in a classroom situation. Some children might find it interesting, in their preparation for the world of work, to shadow someone in a particular occupation for a full day.

You will need access to a word processing package. If shadowing for a full day a voice recorder could be of use.

In this project it is important that you identify clearly the job of the person you are writing about.

Firstly decide who’s day you are going to report on. The easiest person could be a family member. You should put aside a certain about of time to spend talking to your subject.

We would like your finished project to cover the following sections.


The name (only the first name is necessary), age and sex of the person you are interviewing.
Their job
Their job title (if they have one).
How long they have been doing the job.
Any qualifications they needed before they could do the job.



The place they work – indoors or outdoors (or both) – an office or a factory etc.
People they may work with - not names just numbers and whether they work with them all the time or just some of the time.
The hours that they work – do they do the same each day – do they work weekends – do their hours vary each day or week?


In this section you should ask your subject to describe an average day. You could almost use part of a day from the form we have drawn up for the My Day Project except as this is a report, there should be far more detail in each hour.


Find out one or two things your subject really likes about their job.


Find out if there are any parts of the job that the person doesn’t like.


Ask them to explain to you something unusual that has happened in the time they have been doing their job.


Try to find out if your subject has any idea as to what job they might be doing next. Is there a “ladder” within the company so that they know the next step up.


Finally, write a conclusion giving your opinion about the work the person does. Would you like to do it? If so, why? If not, what are the reasons you don’t think you would like it?

Your report should be between 1,000 and 1,500 words.

If you are doing this project on your own at home, you can email a copy of the finished project to us and it may find its way on to our site. Send it to homeprojectsi@owlbut.co.uk That would be owlingly brilliant. Off you go.

We are asking schools to set up a special part of their school website called Owlbut's World of Learning and all work done by pupils should be uploaded there. Each project, if you decide to do more than one, should have a separate section. Send the link to olderowlettesprojects@owlbut.co.uk.

We will start uploading projects sent to us and links from schools in September 2025. The projects and links will be accessed from this page.