Happy New Year! I’m so excited about all the free content that will be coming your way this year. You’re about to get some episodes that are packed with information and things you can do in your classroom or in your writing.
Today’s episode is about goal setting, more specifically - using SMART goals as a writer
I will have a detailed template for you in the show notes, so please click on the link in my show notes to get this helpful free SMART goal worksheet for writers. CLICK HERE for the SMART goals worksheet and lesson plan.
What is a SMART goal?
A SMART goal is a goal that is specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and timed.
This acronym was first discussed by George T. Doran, in 1981 in "There's a S.M.A.R.T. Way to Write Management's Goals and Objectives".
Goals keep you focused and motivated on something you want to achieve, especially when self-doubt and other obstacles get in your way.
The problem with most goals is that they are often too broad in scope and not really something you can measure in a given time. Without this emphasis on time, goals become further and further away from you and seem impossible to achieve.
I have seen this time and time again with not only my students, but with myself. Making and attaining goals really depends on how motivated you are and how you can get over obstacles that get in your way and that make you want to give up. The key to attaining goals is to make the SMART.
Making a SMART goal gives you a specific goal with a due date.
So, how can a SMART goal help writers?
Writing is hard work. It takes a lot of skills and brain power to communicate something effectively. Often times when you’re writing you don’t know whether the people you’re writing for, your intended audience, will actually read what you’ve written. This can become very frustrating and discouraging.
Therefore, staying motivated to write is an obstacle you have to overcome and be aware of things that will distract you.
The larger the goal, the more time it will take to complete. If you are new to writing long stories or reports, it’s better to break those bigger pieces into smaller goals. Teachers, we must do this for our students because even adults struggle with this.
My advice is to start with a small, specific goal that doesn’t take a lot of time that will help you attain a much bigger long term goal. For example, if you want to write a novel, you first have to write a scene. So, make a SMART goal to write a scene first, and then make another SMART goal to write the next scene and so on.
Your SMART goal needs to be specific.
Here are some questions to get at a specific goal:
- What do I want to accomplish?
- Why is this important?
- Who else is involved or needs to help me?
- Where is this goal to be obtained?
- What resources or limits are involved?
Wanting to write a story is not a specific goal.
However, if I want to write a short story about losing a friend in middle school, and the reason this is important is because lots of girls go through this and feel very alone, then I’m being more specific.
Now I have to decide, who is involved? Should I write this as a fictional narrative or a personal one?
The last thing about a specific goal is knowing what resources you have and the limits that are involved.
How much time do you have? How long does it take you to write a page or 250 words. Most short stories are 5-10 pages long.
You also have to ask yourself if you have the skills you need in order to attain that goal.
For example, if you don’t know how to write dialogue correctly, you’ll need to learn this first.
Here’s my specific example of the SPECIFIC part of a SMART goal: I want to write a fictional short story about the end of a friendship because other girls could be suffering the same problem, and I also need to learn the skill of writing dialogue to make my story realistic.
Measuring your SMART goal for writers:
How much time do you want to spend on the goal? How many resources or limits do you have? How much do you want to accomplish within a certain amount of time? How will you know when your goal is accomplished?
Teachers, I usually give my students a week to practice a skill within an assignment. This might be learning how to punctuate dialogue or using common homophones correctly - you’re and your, there, their and they’re. It also might be planning a story. I model and review each skill daily, but it’s up to the student to show that skill in their own writing. I assess to see if they’ve learned the skill, and then either give more information and practice or move onto another skill that builds on from previous skills.
Writers you can do the same thing for yourselves. Learn one new writing skill a week, put it into practice and reread what you’ve written to determine if this skill has improved your writing. I read books, Google and watch YouTube videos about writing skills constantly. I’ve taught myself many of the writing skills I know. You can, too, but focus on learning ONE new thing per week, so you can put it into practice and not feel overwhelmed.
Smart goals need to be attainable.
Goals should stretch you, but not break you. Stepping slightly out of your comfort zone to learn or try something new is good for you. It’s how you grow, but leaping into the unknown is often too scary for people.
Ask yourself:
- How will I accomplish this goal?
- Is this a reasonable goal at this time in my life for me?
- Based on my limits, how realistic is this goal?
- How will I reward myself?
Time is our biggest problem. Knowing whether or not you can accomplish a goal within a time limit is important. Be honest with yourself. Know how long you have to work on something. Also know what can distract you and how you can get rid of those distractions.
It’s also a good idea to think about how you can reward yourself once you attain a goal. This keeps motivation going even when you’re tired or feel less than your best.
A word about whether or not something is attainable - no idea is original. So, if your specific goal is to come up with an original idea for a story about a girl facing a dictatorship that your audience will read, it’s been done before over and over again from the story of Boudica who fought the Roman Empire to Katniss Everdeen who fights the Capitol of Panem. It’s HOW you tell the story that makes it original. Your word choices, how you put those together, etc. This used to be my biggest obstacle to writing, but I’ve learned that specific audiences like specific types of stories. So most likely, if there is an audience for this topic, you will find readers and attain your goal.
Is this goal relevant to what’s going on in your world?
Will the time and hard work you put into your writing be worthwhile to you, even if no one reads it or buys it? Is this the right time for you to try this? Does this match my other efforts or needs?
This is why knowing your intended audience and doing some research is so important. Also, this part of the goal can also help you be realistic about your outcomes. Writing for an intended audience other than yourself means that you want other people to read your writing or listen to what you have to say.
If you are trying to decide between which writing idea to go with, this is where you can make that decision because you have to ask yourself how is this topic or story relevant to me and those around me?
Time-bound goals help you to do so much more than you could ever imagine.
By giving yourself due dates and time limits, you will accomplish a lot more writing. If given more time than you need to write, you will procrastinate. You will find other things to fill up your time, like watching silly cat videos or Live PD for hours on end.
It’s very easy to get distracted from hard work. Writing can be fun, but it’s mentally labor intensive. Consuming other people’s content is a lot more fun, but it doesn’t help us to read our goals.
Not that I’m NEVER distracted, but I try to put away my cell phone or turn off the TV when I’ve got a project, and use those things as a reward once I am finished with a part of my goal. For example, after writing this podcast/blog, I plan to see the new Star Wars movie with my family.
This gives me a time limit for today’s writing. I have to get it done before we go to the movies, but it also gives me a reward. If you’re a video gamer, promise yourself a new game after you accomplish a goal.
How to avoid ineffective writing goals:
Focus on skills, not problems. If one of your goals is to stop writing sentences without punctuation, then the skill you want to practice is slowing down and looking at your writing to see if you need a period. If you’ve written four or five lines of text without a period, most likely, you need to work on punctuation. Or after writing a paragraph, reread what you’ve written aloud to yourself. Where does your voice naturally drop and stop? You most likely need end punctuation there.
Teachers, if you see a lot of students with this problem, this can become a mini-lesson during writers workshop. I do teach students the 4 types of sentences, but this takes a lot of time and repetition, so I have to make sure to give students time to learn simple, compound, complex and compound-complex sentence structures. So, introduce and give lots of practice. There are some programs like Brain Pop, Quill.org, Flocabulary and Nearpod with exercises kids could do to help them practice these skills. It also provides a nice break in writing.
What skills will make your writing more effective? This also helps you to focus and prioritize.
Which skill should you focus on first?
The most important aspect of writing is communication. Does your writing communicate your ideas clearly and effectively? If you give someone your draft, and they don’t understand what’s going on or what your main point is, you need to work one or all of these areas:
- Being clear - keep it simple specific (KISS)
- Organization of ideas
- Editing skills
Choose ONE skill and learn that skill, and then move on to the next skill.
So, if I were to create a SMART goal out of my example above, it would look something like this:
I want to write a fictional short story of 1,000 words about a girl who loses a friendship (to help other girls in the same painful situation) and I want to learn how to punctuate dialogue this week.
S: Write a fictional short story about a middle school girl who loses a friendship
M: 1,000 words
A: I need to learn how to punctuate dialogue
R: This is relevant to middle school girls who go through friendship drama
T: I want to write this in ONE week so I can share it with my students.
Publishing the above story would become a new SMART goal since it would take time for me to figure out where and how to publish a story like this.
That’s all for today’s podcast.
If you would like a copy of the SMART goal Worksheet for Writers, click on the show notes below.
Please rate and comment to keep this podcast going, and to let other teachers and writers know about it.
I hope to see you here next Sunday. Thank you so much for listening and Happy Writing!
CLICK HERE for the SMART goals worksheet and lesson plan.
