Setting Goals

I've been thinking a lot about next year, and what goals I'm going to set for myself.  In  we are either "on" or "off" schedule.  If you are "on schedule", then you have to set 1 goal & be observed 3 times.  If you are "off schedule", then you set 3 goals and are observed 1 time.  Our goals also have to be SMART goals.  These goals, along with our observation and proof of student growth, are combined together at the end of the year to form our evaluation.

Last year, when I sat down with my principal to set my goals, it was an extremely difficult process.  I had several things I wanted to improve on personally, but wasn't allowed to have as my goal because I'm already "good" at them.  Examples: being a leader in the building and improving how I utilize technology in the classroom.

Therefore, I had to set new goals, on top of the goals I actually wanted to do, and the whole thing became a lot to manage.  Please don't misunderstand, I truly believe that teachers should be setting goals for themselves, and reflecting on those goals throughout the year.  The difficult part for me is that I already do that...maybe it's because I'm a reflective person, maybe it's because I intentionally blog about it, I don't know, but to me, having to write additional goals when I already had goals of my own was a bit excessive.

At the end of the year I started to think about what I want this year's goals to be...I didn't want to sit down in my principals office again & have the same experience.  So here's what I came up with:

1) I want to improve parent communication via our classroom website, blog (which the students will be writing at the end of each day).

2) I want to incorporate writing into all content areas, rather than have it as a stand alone subject.

3) I want to incorporate smaller inquires at the beginning of a lesson, rather than at the end.

I plan on blogging more about each of these goals in the near future, but that is what I'm shooting for next year...