In last week’s blog, I talked about setting goals with kids and what that looks like at my house. This week, we are going to dig deeper into the idea of goal setting and take a look at two strategies that are beneficial in helping us achieve our goals.
First, let’s talk about visualizing our goals. This is a strategy that many athletes, performers and businesspeople use regularly. The idea is that we visualize every small detail of our race, performance, goal, etc., from the very beginning to the very end. We focus on our five senses to help us really feel as though we are experiencing the achievement. We acknowledge any obstacles that we may face and work through how we might overcome them. We see ourselves celebrating the accomplishment of achieving our goal.
The second strategy is the use of affirmations to help us overcome challenges while working toward our goal and remind us that we can accomplish what we set out to do. An affirmation can be a statement or mantra that you write down, read and repeat regularly. It’s basically putting the power of positive thinking to work for you.
Examples include:
- I can do hard things.
- I will overcome every challenge that is put in front of me while working toward my goal.
- I will achieve my goal.
Of course, you can add more detail to make the affirmation more specific to your goal.
Affirmations are great to write down and post in an area where you can read them regularly. They can stay the same for as long as you want/need or you can change them up daily/weekly/monthly to fit your needs at the time.
Here’s your homework for today…think about a big goal you have for this year. How can you incorporate visualization and affirmations into your routine to help you achieve your goal?
Once you’ve had practice with each of these strategies, think about how you can introduce them to students. Help them make connections between visualization that we use while reading, visualization we use to calm down and this type of visualization. Similarly, make connections between using affirmations for a self-esteem or self-confidence boost and for goal setting.
There are so many great ways to use these strategies with kids, especially since they are both fairly multi-purpose strategies! How do you foresee these strategies working in your classroom or home environment?
akeducationalconsulting.com 