Appendix 13.2. SMART Goals
How many times have you made New Year’s resolutions and never kept them? Perhaps they
were too broad or unrealistic. The end of the school year is a good time to reflect on where you
are as a teacher and what you should do to improve your teaching.
Rather than broad resolutions, think of goals in SMART terms:
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Specific: The goal is clearly stated and answers these questions: What do I want to do?
Why do I want to do it? How am I going to do it?
Measurable: The goal describes the evidence you’ll use to determine your progress.
Achievable: The goal can be met, given your resources and strengths. The goal is doable
and realistic.
Relevant: The goal relates to student learning and performance.
Timed: The goal has target dates for achievement.
For example, “I want to improve class participation” is a worthy, relevant goal. It can be tweaked
into a SMART goal:
Class participation is vital to student learning. To improve student participation during
large-group activities, I will use three strategies during the next semester to ensure that all
students have opportunities to participate: calling on students randomly, using wait time,
and using turn-and-talk discussions. I will keep an informal tally sheet to monitor how
students participate.
Here are some generic goal areas that new teachers could consider.
Interpersonal Goals
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Improve teacher-parent communication, with a focus on positive communications.
Build better relationships with my academic team and other staff.
Get to know students better.
Organizational Goals
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Establish routines for accessing and returning lab materials.
Establish and maintain a classroom management plan, including expectations, routines,
and rules.
Plan lessons at least one week ahead of time.
Improve documentation for situations that happen in the classroom.
Keep up with inventories and other paperwork.
Keep a record of lessons and units and put together notebooks or files for each unit.
Instructional Goals
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Incorporate inquiry into more lessons.
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Use assessments that focus on higher-level learning.
Introduce science notebooks.
Implement new strategies for ____.
Incorporate more technology in the classroom.
Prepare better substitute plans.
Use a variety of formative assessments
Use the guide on the following page as you create your goals.
Goal:
Date:
Specific: What do I want to achieve?
Measurable: How will I know I’ve achieved the goal (or have made progress)?
Achievable: What resources (i.e., training, materials) will I need to achieve this goal?
Relevant: How will achieving this goal affect student learning?
Timed: What is the time frame for achieving the goal?
Notes and documentation: