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Articles

Goal Setting: An Ongoing Method for Channeling New Energy

Goal Setting: An Ongoing Method for Channeling New Energy

Every January 1st, we all receive a chance to start fresh. While many of us set a New Year’s resolution, often we only manage to stick with it for a week or two! What if there was an approach to starting fresh in the new year that actually produces results? SMART goals—goals…
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Jan 01 2020
Use Envisioning Language and Goal Setting to Promote Student Reflection

Use Envisioning Language and Goal Setting to Promote Student Reflection

Showing Students What Is Possible The language we use with students every day influences how they see themselves. Our words can shape students’ views of themselves years after our direct influence. Envisioning language gives children a vision of what is possible. Many of us can remember someone from our past…
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Dec 16 2019

Setting Goals, Hopes, and Dreams: Connecting Students to the Community

Watching a student show up to school each day excited to learn is one of the great joys of teaching. We give our students that spark when we help them figure out what they want to achieve during the school year, then show them the ways they can achieve those…
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Sep 03 2019
Hopeful teacher and students

What Are Your Hopes?

As we prepare for our upcoming Teachers and Leadership Conferences, we’ve been thinking a lot about hope. Students’ hopes and dreams are, of course, an integral part of the beginning of the school year. In addition to providing students with a model for setting and achieving goals, having students name…
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Jul 26 2018
Responsive Classroom program

Setting a Vision for the Future

As the bustle of the after-school and after-work hours wound down for the night, I found my eight-year-old daughter in tears in her bedroom. She was hunched over her sketch pad. Colored pencils and multiple versions of self-portraits were spread all over the desk. When I asked her what was…
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Apr 12 2018

The Natural Learning Cycle

It’s the perfect time of year to pause and reflect on your personal teaching and learning goals—the hopes and dreams you set when school began. First, let’s take a step back and look at that learning from a big-picture point of view. We know that the most meaningful learning happens…
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Dec 21 2017
Photograph by Jeff Woodward

Self-Assessment and Goal Setting Go Hand in Hand

Fifth grade teacher Ms. Johnson begins class by naming the lesson goal: to write an essay that includes the fundamental elements of persuasion. She displays criteria for good work on the whiteboard and gives each student a checklist of grade-appropriate elements of persuasive writing. She then asks students to take…
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Oct 05 2016
Photography by Jeff Woodward.

Our Hopes and Dreams for School

“What are your hopes and dreams for the school year?” Many teachers ask this question in the first weeks of school to help students get excited about learning and make a personal connection to what they will learn in school. Inviting students to name learning goals (hopes and dreams) right…
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Jul 29 2015
Photograph by Jeff Woodward.

“It All Begins With Hopes and Dreams”

Six months ago, a second grader at Roundtown Elementary, a K–3 school in York, Pennsylvania, brought a simple idea to a whole-school assembly—to place a bench on the playground for students who feel lonely and want someone to play with—and the story went viral. First, the “buddy bench” idea was…
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Jul 28 2014

Books for Hopes and Dreams (2012)

Recommending children's books that teachers can use to begin talking about goal-setting and with their students has become an annual ritual for me. (Here are my picks for 2011 and 2010.) This year I found so many that I can't even share them all! Hope and optimism are apparently alive…
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Aug 15 2012

Helping Students Maintain Positive Mindsets

Recently, I ran the Rock 'n' Roll USA 2012 Marathon in Washington, DC. At about mile 19 of the 26.2 mile run, I realized that the goal time I'd set for myself was not achievable. For the next mile or so, I felt defeated—I had done so much work towards…
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Apr 09 2012

More Books for Hopes and Dreams

A recent post on Facebook for more ideas about books to use with hopes and dreams made me think about why some stories work so well to inspire children to think about what they want to accomplish in school and beyond. I think it's because so many great picture books…
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Sep 09 2011

The First Six Weeks of School

The early weeks of each new school year offer teachers distinct opportunities and challenges. It is during this time—when expectations and routines are established, rules generated, and goals articulated—that the foundation is laid for a productive and cooperative year of learning. As teachers, we work hard to convey, from the…
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Jul 19 2011

Reflecting on Hopes and Goals

As the school year winds down, how will your students reflect on the hopes, dreams, and goals they set for this year? Many books could inspire this sort of reflection, including those I wrote about in "Read-Alouds to Inspire Hopes and Dreams" and "Revisiting Hopes and Dreams in the New…
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May 18 2011

The Art of Rules

As an art teacher, I'm always looking for ways to adapt Responsive Classroom practices to specialist areas. Here's an idea I came up with for having students do the Hopes and Dreams and classroom rule creation process while incorporating explorations in art. Early in the fall, we made a paper…
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Apr 04 2011

Setting Good Goals

"My goal is to get into shape this year." "My resolution for this year is to get to know my students better." "I want to do more professional reading this year." "My goal is to give kids more choice about their learning." "I want to be the best teacher I…
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Dec 28 2010

I Want to Be a Dentist!

For teachers who use the Responsive Classroom approach, talking with students about hopes and dreams (or hopes and goals) is a key activity during the first weeks of school. This discussion launches the rule-making process and helps children create rules that they have a real stake in: rules that will…
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Sep 03 2010

Read-Alouds to Inspire Hopes and Dreams

By now you probably know how much I love children's books! Here are some that would be perfect for launching a discussion of hopes and dreams—the first step in the Responsive Classroom approach to creating classroom rules with students. Last winter I shared a few read-aloud ideas in a post…
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Aug 25 2010
Photograph by Jeff Woodward.

Revisiting Hopes and Dreams in the New Year

Reflection and goal-setting are often a focus for adults in January, when the beginning of a new calendar year prompts us to think about what we've accomplished and what we hope to do next. You can bring this reflective, purposeful energy into your classroom by having your students revisit the…
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Dec 31 2009

My Hope and Dream for You

A few weeks before school ended last year, I wrote my fourth grade students notes stating a “hope and dream” for each of them as they moved on to fifth grade. My goals were to help them feel proud of their accomplishments over the year and to encourage them to…
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Apr 01 2009

Hopes Make Goals Come Alive in a Speech & Language Classroom

Setting and working toward goals with students is a key element of my work as a speech/language pathologist. Each student I work with has an Individualized Education Plan (IEP) which names goals for that child. After reading Rules in School I realized that the “hopes and dreams” process described in…
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Aug 01 2008

Hopes and Dreams in a Primary Classroom

I love the beginning of each school year with the coming of fresh new faces to excited to learn. Most of my students have been to kindergarten and come to first grade with some ideas and expectations about what they’ll be doing there. But they also come with an eagerness…
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Aug 01 2001

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