Goal Setting for Kids
Effective problem solving skills and learning how to control emotions are two key steps in successful goal setting for kids. (Both of these issues are discussed in related articels that you can link to at the bottom of this article) It is our job as parents to act as mentors to our children in this process. It is not our job to take over and do it for our kids. Our children will also need someone to give them realistic, positive and supportive feedback. This is where we can become more actively involved in helping our kids to achieve their goals. Goal setting for kids generally evolves around how to deal with everyday situations. The older our children the more complex the goals become. It can be as simple as learning how to climb on a climbing frame at the local play park to learning to navigate the ordeals of the teenager.
Making Goal Setting for Kids Realistic and Fun Goal setting for kids needs to be realistic and achievable. We need to help our kids set realistic goals so they can win at this game. At the same time we need to make sure the goals are not too easy. If the goal setting for our kids is too easy, they will lose interest and expect everything to automatic happen for them. This will rob them of being able to enjoy and win challenges that come their way in life, both now and when they are older. Achieving something that is challenging (yet achievable) is a great way to increase child self confidence. If you are unsure of what is challenging for your child and what is simply too hard check out my article on
baby development stages.
It is also important to be able to continually gauge the emotional levels of our children when goal setting for our kids. Remember when we are feeling low even the smallest hill can seem insurmountable. So when our kids are feeling sad or low make the goal setting or challenges relatively easy. On the other hand the more confident our kids feel the more we can challenge our kids to push themselves just that little bit harder. As our child's emotional teacher it is our job to keep the bigger picture in mind. Remember that our aim to make our kids good at setting and achieving goals to make their lives both now and later better. So we want to guide them to make realistic goals, and to find ways to achieve the goal. One way we can be effective mentors to our kids is to help them to analyse their goals or problems and help them to break these goals into smaller more easily achievable components. For example we can make sure the end goals is what they really want to achieve. Talk to them about the goal, ask them what they want to achieve, what they expect to get from achieving the goal. Through talking about the goal and its results you are helping them to firstly make the goal realistic. And secondly you can use the “why” behind the goal to motivate your child when they find the going too hard. That is reminding them why they wanted to achieve the goal in the first place, get them excited about achieving the goal all over again. Remember when we feel good or excited about something it is easier to find solutions to problems. Breaking down a task into smaller more manageable segments is another one of our roles as our kids support in their goal setting. For example, my son got a 3-D ball puzzle for Christmas, he normally loves puzzles but found this one particularly hard. It was different to what he had done before and had more pieces. He found it hard to get over these two obstacles. However, once I helped to break it down into more manageable sections he found doing the puzzle a lot easier. All I did was sort the pieces into the right number segments and let him put it altogether. I did not do the puzzle for him, in fact I did not put in one piece; my job was to simply guide him, not to do it for him. His sense of achievement was incredible, he was so proud of himself. The sense of pride and achievement that he got from doing what initially seemed impossible was amazing. He was so proud of himself; he beamed from ear to ear and took if off to school the following day to show his class mates. The self confidence that he got from doing the puzzle by himself is what goal setting for kids is all about. To read more on goal setting for kids click on the links below
To read more on how to develop an emotionally intelligent child click on the following links
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