Five Tips to Help Kids Set Back-to-School Goals
Back-to-school season feels full of potential, doesn’t it? Something about the back-to-school clothes and supplies, or the new schedules and impending change of seasons really make us feel refreshed as families. This year holds great promise and you can’t wait to dig in!
Or maybe your own family’s experience is a bit different, and you’re suffering from the back-to-school blues. Summer was so much fun! You really loved having your kids home, they recovered from their chronic exhaustion, and you all finally feel refreshed and connected. You’re enjoying your new rhythm, and you’re not ready to hit the grind again.
Whether you’re full of optimism or dread, you can help your kids make this school year count by teaching them to set their own back-to-school goals.
We all know that goal-setting is important for adults: it is linked to greater self-confidence, autonomy, and motivation. Furthermore, research also shows that setting goals and then forming a good implementation plan—which includes writing them down and sharing the goal with others—is associated with a much higher chance of actually achieving those goals.
For kids, the benefits of goal-setting are numerous. Working on their goals helps them to develop greater self-confidence and sense of self, and also improves their locus of control and strategic thinking and planning skills.
So how can you help your kids succeed at goal-setting? How can you support them in this journey, instead of taking control and making their school goals one more thing to nag them about? Below are five tips to get you started in helping your kids set realistic, holistic goals.
Connect.
Have a “date” with each of your children. Let them pick the activity, and be sure you have some quiet time to start talking a bit more seriously. Enjoy the quality time together. Your kids will take this process more seriously when they feel valued, supported, and connected to you.
Brainstorm.
Chances are that if you start off the conversation with, “Well, Jr., what are some academic and personal goals you have for this year?” you’re going to get blank stares. Lead in gently, especially with young children. Try to get a variety of topics brewing. Ask open-ended questions like:
“What are you excited/nervous about this school year?”
“Is there anything special you want to do or accomplish this year?”
Or build off of your own knowledge of them. “I saw how much you enjoyed soccer camp this summer. Do you think you’d like to develop that skill more this year, or are you ready for something else?”
Refine.
Now that you’ve got some great ideas, help your child start to hone in on what he or she is most interested in accomplishing. Again, try to let your kids do the thinking and planning as much as possible. “So you want to learn guitar, improve your soccer skills, be on the yearbook committee, and bring your math grade up. That sounds like a lot. What do you think?”
Help your kids achieve balance in their goals by encouraging them to focus on perhaps one goal in a few different areas of life (health, finances, academics, etc.).
And if the goal is vague, help them figure out how to define it. “Do better at school” might become something like “Bring my grades up by one full letter.”
Plan.
Now that your kids have picked some goals they’re excited about, help them develop a plan to achieve them. Once again, try to put the burden of creating this plan on them, so they can learn to think strategically about how to achieve their dreams.
If one of their goals is to read five books not required for school, ask them something like, “How do you think you can make this happen?” One solution might be 30 minutes of no-screen “down time” before bed, so they can unwind by reading.
Introduce the concept of smaller goals, or stair-step goals, that will help them to achieve their big goals. If they want to get an A in biology this year, a stair-step goal might include four 30-minute study sessions per week. If they want to learn a new instrument, stair-step goals might be researching the instrument, forming a plan for getting it, finding a teacher, practicing five times a week, etc.
Log it.
A study by the American Society of Training and Development found that simply committing to someone that you are going to do a specific task gives you a 65% chance of following through. And setting a regular appointment time with that person to work on the goal increases that chance to 95%.
Show your kids how to log their goals in FamilyWorks. Then, check in with them at your weekly family meeting. If they are routinely not accomplishing their goals, offer the family’s support. “We see you’re having a hard time coming up with the time to practice five times a week. Is there anything we can do to help you find time?”
But remember that these are their goals, not yours. Your kids will only learn the importance of goal-setting and follow-through if you let them experience the natural consequences of failing to do the work themselves. So back off!
One final tip is to celebrate your children’s successes together. When they achieve one of their stair-step goals, do something fun together! When they have an off week, encourage them by reminding them that next week can be better. Don’t get hung up on anything they fail to do, but rather focus on what they are doing well.
Goal-setting is an awesome opportunity for them to start “practicing” adult skills. Your job is to be their support, their consultant, and their biggest fan along the way.