New year, New me, New class, New Students.
How to use SMART goals to set targets in education this New year.
New years is a time of celebration and partying and I don’t know about you but for me it’s definitely about reflection too. Many people chose New year to make goals for the incoming year and resolutions of things to stop or change, to make their lives better. For me this is absolute heaven as I LOVE making lists and checking them off, so this is something I can totally get behind, but can we use this time of reflection and self evaluation with our students too? Of course! What better back to school January activity is there for you to do? Either as a group, to come up with some targets for the whole group to achieve together, or to set individually and check back on through the following weeks, or months. So How exactly are we going to go about tackling this task with our kiddos? We can use SMART goals.
What are SMART goals?
If you haven’t heard the term, that’s okay. If you have, here’s a quick refresher.
SMART stands for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant and Time based. It is a goal setting technique used to define the parameters of your goal to ensure the objectives are doable within a certain time frame. This way of working allows us to eliminate any guesswork and establishes clear steps for us to take in order to reach our target.
S - Specific
In order for any goal to be achievable it needs to be specific. If we generalise a goal it makes it harder to reach as it’s so big in our minds. For example I want to grow my website (general) vs I want to use Pinterest to grow my website by 10%.(specific). Which one do you think is easier to do?
Some other questions we might answer to be specific could be:
What needs to be accomplished?
Who’s responsible for it?
What steps need to be taken to achieve it?
M - Measurable
We need to quantify our goals so it makes it easier to track progress and know when you’ve reached the finish line. Without measuring our progress how do we know we’ve achieved it?
Now for example we could say I want to grow my website by 10% and make 5 sales per day. If we make those 5 sales or more we will know that our goal has been reached.
A - Achievable
This is such an important step and often one we miss when we are goal setting. It’s great to have big dreams and shoot for the stars, but if we give ourselves too many things to do, or make such big demands on ourselves we are bound to fail. Achievability is so important, because we don’t want to set ourselves up to fail from the start. Isn’t it better to take smaller steps and reach them. Then once we do get those targets met we can reflect once more and make new goals to keep moving forward.
The point I’m really getting at here is Rome wasn’t built in a day.
R - Relevant
How are these SMART goals going to fit into the bigger picture? Does it fit with what you need to do in your life? Does it have a purpose and lead you on to something else? Relevance is key. It should fit with your life code, values and long term plan.
T - Time based
Of course setting a time limit is important when goal setting. It gives us a push and motivation to complete the goal. It also helps us to keep our goal at the forefront of our minds. This in turn helps us complete our goal.
This all sounds great right? But why would we use this in our classrooms and with our ESL students? I hear you ask. Well, personally I think it helps develop a positive relationship between us and our students. We can ask them their point of view and to self evaluate. Then when they share a goal with us we can advise them, help them, direct them and motivate them to complete it. This strengthens the bond between teacher and student and that’s a great achievement already. By sharing our targets with our peers and classmates, we also create a positive and supportive atmosphere in our classrooms. As children will check in with each other and cheer each other on. Students will feel more confident in themselves and also problem
solve if things don’t go quite to plan. So there are so many reasons to use
SMART goals and it’s something our kids can take away and use in adult life
too, creating good coping strategies and life skills for their future.
So how do I do it with my ESL students? Firstly, we start off by learning or reviewing the SMART acronym and the main points of each letter.
I also have this poster in my classroom.
FREE DOWNLOAD HERE
Then I like to do a group brainstorm for behaviours they want to change or goals they want to reach.By doing it as a group first, the stronger students will help the weaker students in the class. This is vital for ESL as maybe some students don’t have the right vocabulary to express themselves. Then we break out into partners to discuss personal strengths and weaknesses and at this point I like getting the partners to listen, but question why? How? What happens if…? Sometimes we have a one track mind with goal setting so we often forget to look at the plot holes. Finally children will tell me their goal and complete the New Year New Me Flip Book I have made.
Why is this an important step? If it’s written, it’s less likely to be forgotten. The flip book is great to take away or carry on them so they can share with others such as friends or family. It’s a cute memory book for years to come and also looks great on any bulletin board too.
By far the best thing about the flip book is that it holds students accountable. They can check back with it in a week, month, or term and see for themselves if they have completed their goals.
Try the flip book out for yourself and let me know how you get on. I know my students love it and I’m sure your class will have fun with it too!
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