Teaching Leadership Through Goal-Setting

In April, Healthy Learning MTL will be presenting at The Study’s Student Leadership Conference on the powerful role of using goal-setting as a tool to develop leadership skills in students.

Leadership is a powerful word, but it remains a vague and ill-defined concept. The reason for this is that, in many ways, leadership is subjectively defined. For some people, it means doing more than your share. For other people, it might mean setting an example for others, or it might mean directing or inspiring others. All of these various styles and approaches to leadership can make it a challenging concept to explain. Although there are common elements that are understood when people speak about leadership, for educators, a bigger question presents itself: How do you teach leadership?

One of the biggest challenges in understanding leadership is how you measure it. Ask yourself: How do I know if my students are developing leadership skills? The answer is the same as when we ask how do we know if they are learning to read, to write, to think critically, etc. Simply stated, you measure the change that you want to see.

Goal-setting is a concrete way of teaching and measuring the development of key leadership skills that include:

1. Problem identification: Teach students how to identify an area of improvement or an area of interest that they wish to conquer.
2. Setting a goal: There are many ways to set goals; however, it is important for goal setting to be measurable. Consider using the SMART system of goal-setting (Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Realistic, and Time-bound).
3. Developing a plan: How does the student plan on accomplishing the goal? What resources will they need? What obstacles can they anticipate?
4. Spreading out the workload and delegating (if in a team context): Group contexts, delegation, and teamwork are all excellent opportunities to develop some of the more intangible leadership skills, such as communication, problem-solving, and teamwork.
5. Evaluating progress and adjusting the plan: We cannot expect students to make perfect plans that will guarantee goal accomplishment. There has to be opportunity for feedback, suggestions, and realignment of the plan.
6. Reflection and learning: The reflection component of goal-setting is often the most overlooked, but it can have amazing benefits for learning. Encouraging reflection through discussion or formal reflection assignments can bring to light challenges and how they were overcome or might be overcome in the future. It also promotes the generalization of goal-setting practices to other contexts.

When working with children at home or at school, it is important to involve them in the goal-setting process so that we can model how to set goals effectively. Children are often left out of the discussion of goal setting for individualized education plans or performance improvement plans. They need to be part of the discussion to take ownership, accountability, and develop the skills that are mentioned above.

There are three things that we can do to help kids learn to set and achieve their goals:

1. Model – One key step to instructing intangible skills, such as goal-setting or critical thinking, is to model exactly what we want to see from our students. An excellent method for doing this is the “think-aloud” approach where teachers talk through their thought process as they complete a complex task.
2. Scaffold – Once the specific behaviour has been modelled, it’s important to take small steps towards ensuring that the student has just the right amount of support to allow them to succeed and build their skill set. A good way to think of scaffolds is to use the example of training wheels on a bike, which are used for a short time, but are eventually removed to promote greater autonomy.
3. Fade – As the student becomes more autonomous in the goal-setting, take the supports away gradually. For example, you can reduce the intensity or frequency of meetings to discuss goal progress as necessary.

Teaching goal-setting will not create leaders overnight, but it sets children on a path of accountability and skill set development that will allow them to become effective leaders later on. Perhaps the best part of goal-setting is that it can be paired with almost any activity in any context. It allows for measuring progress and teaching what is needed to make the desired gains.

Here are a few resources that can help with the goal-setting process:

1. Dawson, P., & Guare, R. (2018). Executive skills in children and adolescents: A practical guide to assessment and intervention. Guilford Publications.
2. How to Teach Kids Perseverance and Goal-Setting 
3. SMART Goal-Setting with Students