SMARTER GOAL SETTING

Labour Weekend has been beaut weatherwise and spent at home (always nice). Jo headed to Gisborne, Ken into the bush and Renee came home and along with her, her friends. Gorgeous weather has made it magic yet work has encroached on the sheer luxury of it all. Gardening etc around home has been invigorating plus there has been the inevitable school work. I have thoroughly enjoyed the smattering of sunshine I've allowed myself, although being a greedy sun fiend, I would have loved lots more time out there. I've loved having the kids here and even with the house filled I feel as though I am at least making some headway into the pile up of school work that needs to be actioned.

Last night Renee and her friends went down to the beach surfcasting. I spent the time preparing for the Principals' workshop organised to happen on Friday and developing a draft Action Plan. And then there is the e-learning leaders day on Wednesday.

Today the kids headed out to the Bayfair shops in Tauranga when I stole the time to reflect on the sustainability of our e-learning developments within our schools. We're coming into our last year of 3 next year and need to make sure we make the most of every opportunity we have and set people up to continue their success.

I specifically spent sometime considering the goal setting processes and admit they need lots more rigour. How? My thinking shows that we need to develop our Action Research processes so that they impact more fully in all cases to improve student achievement outcomes in a rich and meaningful way. While this had been the intention this year and we can celebrate some success, we need to do more. Success has come to some. For others, I am not so sure.

I think the action research processes need to be more clearly defined, taking the tools far more deeply into learning. Goals set need to be acknowledged and supported within school performance development processes so that value and interaction can occur irrespective of any cluster initiatives. This is one way that sustainability and growth in teaching and learning practices using ICTs will continue beyond the contract term.

SMART then SMARTER

I came across the SMART goal setting process and as I found out more, I could see it working well in defining the thinking required. I designed a process to fit this and edited the action learning page on the cluster's wiki.

SMART GOAL SETTING:

S pecific
M easurable
A ttainable
R ealistic
T imeframed

I thought I was doing quite well and shared this with Renee. What a coincidence. She is working her staff through a very similar process but had an even better model. Aren't kids stimulating!

"SMARTER" was a concept introduced to me by R. i.e. All the above with the addition of
S pecific
M easurable
A ttainable Action Plan
R ealistic
T imeframed
E xtending
R ewarding

The ER makes such a difference. E could also represent Evaluate but hopefully reflection has now grown to a self managed expectation and is deeply embedded into teacher/learner practice.

I've researched more and know that there are other terms that can be applied but these ones have got my bells ringing. I can feel my passion and excitement growing.

This would work well for kids too. Perhaps simplified? Definitely could be part of the school-wide self-assessment and e-portfolio processes.

I've made an online form up for people to capture and record their goals, to stimulate thinking and to help in engaging and channeling that rigour. Posted it up on the cluster wiki so it is all ready for people to use from now on. Well ahead of the 2010 deadline. Yeehaa! What a great feeling.

Love it!! Think it will help in moving us into a more sustainable goal setting and growth process.