Goal Setting and Motivation Ideas for Middle Schoolers
When we bring our large green tupperware container of Christmas ornaments up from the basement, I get a little excited. Not only because we are about to take a walk down memory lane with each ornament that we pull out of the box, but also because I know what’s sitting on top of our collection of glass memories - a folded sheet of notebook paper.
When we open the lid of the container, this folded paper is the first thing pulled out. One person reads the resolutions each person wrote down and we talk about the progress we made towards the goals. I love this time so much because it is always amazing to me to see how much progress and growth each member of my family has made in one short year. Although sometimes we do not always fulfill our resolutions, most of the time we make progress.
There is something powerful about writing our goals, talking about them, and knowing we are going to be held accountable when they are revisited at the end of the year.
One year I asked my students about their resolutions, and was shocked at how many of them didn’t even know what I was talking about. I made a commitment right then that I would incorporate goal setting into our classroom. It’s a valuable skill to learn how to analyze where you are and visualize where you want to be.
If you want to help your students learn to make goals, here are four activities you can do to help them start their journey. You can take the ideas and adapt them to your classroom, or click on the link for a ready-to-go resource.
New Year, New Goals Goal Setting Activity
This is my favorite activity because of the reflection piece!
Have students complete freestyle journal entries where they reflect on what went well last year, their challenges, time wasting habits, and their future best self.
Provide time for students to think about how they want their best life to look like one year from now.
Show students how to write a goal. I like the GROW method. For each key area of their life-academics, personal, and relationships, students write a goal (G), explain their current reality (R), develop organized (O) steps to help accomplish their goal, and explain how it will feel when they win (W) and reach their goal.
For a bonus activity, have students create a digital vision board with images and quotes that reflects their future self.
Goal Setting Monitoring Notebook
What we focus on increases! Have your students keep a notebook where they can track their progress on a weekly and daily basis.
Everyday take 3 minutes at the beginning of class for students to write their overall goal, steps needed that day to help reach the goal, and what they are thankful for.
In addition, have students graph their grades in their notebook once a week. I started doing this because almost all of the goals were associated with grades, and I noticed most students had no idea what their grades actually were because they never logged in to check them. Knowing where you are is the first step to reaching your goal, right? Help your students learn how to monitor their grades with a simple graph. Just print off some graphs, have the students write the date on the X-axis and the numbers on the Y-axis. Once a week, set aside about 5 minutes for students to log into their account, check their grades, and graph it. It is a great visual tool to track weekly progress.
One-Word One-Pager
If you do not have a lot of time to spend on goal setting, then this activity will give you the most bang for your buck!
Students select one word that they want to focus on for the year. This word should be something they want to live out everyday like joy, compassion, persistence, determination, grit, optimism, etc.
In order to make this meaningful, have students dig deep into why they selected this word with 6 questions:
Why is this your word?
How will you make it happen?
Who can hold you accountable?
How will you handle challenges?
How will you feel when you live out this word?
What does this word mean to you?
I Am Motivational Activity -
If you have students who need a mindset shift in the new year, then this is the activity for you! Walk your students through three steps to reframe their thoughts.
Watch a video about the power of I Am thoughts.
Have students list the negative stories they tell themselves or list things people have told them. For example, growing up my parents told me I was lazy, so that would be a negative story I would write down.
Have them select 1-2 negative thoughts they want to reframe into positive I Am Statements. They will rewrite the negative stories into positive I Am statements. For example, I would take the I am lazy statement and change it to I am a hardworker. (I would not write I am not lazy because that still has the negative word in it). Let your students know it’s ok if they don’t believe it yet. Writing it out is the first step in making it happen.
If you’re a member, all of these resources are available as a bundle on TpT and ELA Unlimited. Just log into the main page and click on Spotlight Resources. Click here to log-in, download, and start using ASAP!