Mindarie child care centres encourage goal setting as part of their early learning programmes. Goal setting is one way young children can develop planning and organisational skills and help them to understand how to achieve something that may seem too large for them at first. Crystal enrolled her son Cedric into Mindarie kids care, which her sister’s daughters had gone to. She knew the centre encouraged the children to learn how to set goals and she felt this would be good for her little boy as well.
Learning Skills for Life
Goal setting helps children learn to troubleshoot and problem solve and sets them on the path to being successful in school and beyond. Goal setting is not just about the initial goal, but includes assessing risk, breaking down a task into steps and creating an achievable plan. Goal setting helps children develop important skills for many areas in life such as finance, health, career setting and friendships.
Teacher Directed Goal Setting
- In Cedric’s childcare centre, the educators start teaching goal setting by giving the children simple goals such as picking up five red balls or drawing three circles. They may then give the child a goal to achieve that is set in the future such as bringing something from home.
- At the stage where children are asked to set their own goals, the activity starts with discussions around what the children might like to achieve. They might want to learn to hop, to catch a ball or to write their name.
- The next step is to get the children to record their goal as a picture or other method. Then educators work with the children to plan steps in how to achieve their goal. The goal is revisited over a set time period.
- An important part of the learning experience is to evaluate the end result, whether the goal was achieved or not. Children can think about what they did well and what could have been done better.
Child-centred Approach to Goal Setting
Mindarie child care educators combine goal setting activities with a play based child centred approach. Goal setting activities are designed for children to work on independently, with cards, pictures and board games that involve children setting a goal and then working toward reaching it. Children’s own interests can direct the programme planning allowing them to develop skills suited to their developmental level and at their own pace.
Why Include Goal-Setting in the Early Learning Programme?
Many adults struggle with achieving their goals. Introducing goal setting techniques at a young age can help them with important tasks that may otherwise seem too difficult over their lifetime. Making friends, passing tests or exams, learning a particular skill or sport, or just doing the dishes every night are all goals that people can struggle with. Learning established techniques that help children assess their goals as realistic, then break them into achievable steps sets them up for success in so many ways.
