Creating Writing Goals is Easier than you Think

Do you ever find yourself saying over and over again, “Make sure you have a capital letter” or “You have one long run-on sentence”? One of the ideas I incorporated into my classroom last year in the middle of the year was writing goals. I wish I would have done it sooner!

Creating writings goals to practice grammar and conventions. Put on a bulletin board or a poster for students to refer back to during Writer's workshop, Centers, morning work, or any other time of day in which they are writing.

When you find yourself sounding like a parrot, like I did, it usually means you are lacking something. You need a system in place to help students remember the classroom expectations or routine. Having students create their own reading and writing goals makes them feel more accountable if they come up with the idea themselves. It’s also one way to help give them some choice in the classroom that is controlled, with a limited amount of choices. It helps them to monitor their writing, and I’m handing more of the power over to them.

Hold a {short} Writing Conference

I start by meeting for individual writing conferences with my students. It doesn’t take long to meet with each student and discuss what they feel their writing goal should be. To start the discussion I simply state that they should consider what I ask them to “fix” in their writing all of the time. Just about all of my students choose the skill I feel they should work on. This tells me they know what they need to do, they just need a little extra support. However, if you’re wondering what I do if students choose another skill, I am okay with that. It really doesn’t matter what they pick! We typically work on more than one skill throughout the year anyway.

Then, once my students have chosen a skill to work on, I place their name next to the goal on the bulletin board.

Create a writing goals bulletin board for your Eric Carle classroom theme. — My writing board for my Eric Carle classroom theme at the beginning of the year.

As the year goes on, I find myself reminding them as they are writing to check their writing goal. This is something I can say to the whole class, and I find myself saying less and less, “check your writing words book.” As a side note, this is something we use in 2nd grade instead of a word wall. We get ours from Really Good Stuff.

I continually model using the writing goals to check what their goals are. Plus, it lists all of the goals, so they have a place to reference the expectations for writing anytime throughout the day. And trust me, they use it often! If not, I point to it or say “writing goals” and they know exactly what to do.

The Result

Not only do I feel myself sounding less like a tape recorder, I hear students saying things like, “I remembered capital letters because that’s my goal.” It’s a nice change not having to repeat myself all of the time.

Later, when I feel they have mastered their writing goal, I ask them how they think they are doing doing. Then, they pick a new skill and I move their name on the bulletin board. It’s also a great way to discuss that once a goal has been achieved, we set a new goal.