Goal setting is part of education. There are goals for students each year. As students learn how to work in class, they also learn how to set goals and achieve them. Setting goals and working toward them is an important skill that students should learn from kindergarten. In fact, the process of setting goals is an evidence-based practice, and working toward them has a positive impact on students. It helps students maintain a growth mindset that focuses on learning new things and acquiring new skills.
Here's a guide to help students set goals using our favorite classroom learning resources.
What is the goal?
A goal is a focused goal or outcome that you want to achieve. Eating a bowl of ice cream after dinner is a desire. Reading 100 words correctly per minute is a goal. All goals should be SMART.
- Specific: What do you want to accomplish?
- Measurability: How will you know when you have achieved your goal?
- Attainable: What goals can you achieve?
- Relevance: Which goals are important to you? What is important to you about your goals?
- Time limit: How much time will you have to achieve your goal?
Therefore, SMART student goals are:
- Kindergarten: I can read 10 sight words now, and I would like to read 20 sight words by winter break.
- 3rd Grade: I know the multiplication tables up to 7. I want to know the multiplication tables up to 10 within the next 4 weeks.
- Middle School: I want to raise my math grade from a C to a B by the end of the semester.
- High School: After completing the SAT prep course, I would like to score 1200 on the SAT in May.
These goals are specific, and students will know when they have achieved them. These goals are realistic, important to the student, and achievable within a reasonable time frame.
How to Teach Goal Setting
Goal setting is something you can incorporate into your classroom throughout the year. Here are some of our favorite books, tools, and resources to help you teach this important skill.
Use picture books
It is helpful to share books with all students that describe the process of setting goals, wanting something, setting a clear goal, and working toward it. In the early grades, Peter’s efforts in Ezra Jack Keats’ Whistle for Willie are a classic example of working steadily toward a specific goal. Gaia Cornwall’s Jabari Jumps also shows how one character jumps off a diving board to achieve an achievable goal.
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind (Young Reader's Edition) for Seniors is a book written by William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer that chronicles William's efforts to save his village from drought. It includes sub-goals he sets out to accomplish along the way, such as researching viable solutions and figuring out how to build a windmill.
A great picture book option for older students is Paula Yoo’s Sixteen Years in Sixteen Seconds: The Sammy Lee Story. This book is a biography of a diver who set and achieved physical and academic goals on his way to becoming an Olympic athlete. Picture book biographies are often great for teaching goal setting because they revolve around notable goals.
Learn more: How and why to use picture book electricity in the classroom
Talk about goals
To make goal setting a part of your everyday conversation, talk about your goals and include these inspiring goal quotes in your conversations, morning meetings, and reflections.
Learn more: Inspiring Goal Setting Quotes
Start small
Start with small goals. These are the kind of goals that can be achieved in one or two lessons. Have students write their goals on sticky notes and look back at them as soon as they achieve them. When students reach their goals, celebrate the small victory by ringing a bell or clapping (if the students want to).
Unravel the goal setting process with your students
This goal setting worksheet helps students think about what they want to work on, starting with their strengths. Encourage students to think specifically about what they want to get better at. How can they improve in science in the next unit? Or what would it look like to improve in math?
Get: Goal Setting Worksheet
Track your progress
Once students have set their goals, it’s time to track them! Use this goal tracker to help students track their progress. Remind students that progress may not be linear, but the goal is to see progress over time.
Get it: Learning Tracking Printable
Track and reflect
Another way to track progress is to do a quick reflection on how well your goals are being met. For elementary school students, set a goal and then have them mark each day whether they have met or reached their goal. So if your goal is to memorize the 10 times table but you haven’t practiced multiplication, fill in the sad face. The point is not to make students feel bad, but to reflect on how our choices and actions affect our ability to achieve our goals.
Get it: Daily Goal Tracker Printable
Graph progress
Use graphs to help students create a growth chart. Use graphs to reinforce student progress and communicate student progress to parents. This is especially useful when students are working on goals that are not reflected in test results.
Get it: Printable Goal Tracking Graph
Encourage non-academic goals too
If there are personality traits in your school or classroom, set goals for how students can demonstrate these traits. This will remind students that they can improve respect, kindness, patience, and other skills.
Habit Tracking
Creating habits such as reading 20 pages a day, doing one act of kindness every day, or doing 20 pushups during every break are long-term goals. Have students set goals that they want to become habits and use a habit tracker to complete them for a month. At the end of the month, think about how difficult the behavior is and how it changes if you continue to do it for 28-31 days.
Get it: Printable Habit Tracker
Creating Classroom Goals
Another way to model and practice goal setting is to set goals for the class. Set goals to master reading or math skills, perform acts of kindness, or plan and lead a reading buddy session with your kindergarten class. Class goals build class culture and a sense of community for your students. Note: You can use a habit tracker to track your class goals and take time at the end of each day to reflect on how you achieved your class goals that day.
Plan for longer term goals
For middle and high school students with goals that take more than a few weeks to complete, have them write milestones and mini-goals into their course schedule. Use this editable course lesson outline to help students break down their big goals into smaller chunks to be completed each day or week.
Get it: Editable Course Lecture Summary
Share assessment data with students
When you receive the results from the assessment, share them with the class and with students individually. Have a conversation about reflection. This is a good time for students to reflect on what they did well and what they should aim for next.
Celebrate!
This doesn't mean throwing a party. Celebrate students when they reach their goals with applause, verbal praise, or some other small celebration. Think of a way to celebrate as a class. Fireworks, applause, a chant, or a short dance. The idea is to acknowledge and celebrate the student's achievement of a goal while also providing intrinsic motivation.