Penning down your goals on paper is a great way of actually achieving them. Besides the other things, the approach you take to formulate your goals determines your academic success. Students can either write down the first thing that pops in their mind, or patiently inquire each of their goal through a 5-step approach to goal creation. Creating and executing a course of action for each goal will also you in regard of accomplishing them.
The 5-Step Approach
Writing down powerful and precise goal statements is easier said than done. There are a number of considerations to be taken into account. Once you formulate the goal statement, the work is not finished, but then the student will be required to refine it. Due to the reason that you have different courses in each semester, therefore, they must be acknowledged with different requirements and dealt accordingly. For instance, if you are enrolled in four courses in the next semester, then you need to go through the process four times.
1. An unconfirmed goal statement
In the initial draft, or the unconfirmed goal statement, the student need to state the things he or she wants to accomplish. One of the best practice is to start the pointers with ‘I want to…’ sentences for each goal.
2. State down any kind of obstructions
Ponder over the facts that could compromise your academic success such as certain aspects in your course requirements, assessments, quizzes, presentations, etc. State down the difficulties you can most probably encounter throughout your semester. For instance, not many students appreciate the fact that the exams are going to come in the form of long and tedious writing pieces. This will enter your list of difficulties especially when you are not relaxed at attempting descriptive writing exams. Other difficulties might include the attendance concerns, preparing presentations on PPT slides, brainstorming topics in the arts class, etc.
3. The resources at your disposal
The foremost step is to consider your general resources. You have completed your high school and are about to enter a degree program in a college or university, obviously you will be expected to be adequately versed in the background of some core subjects. Consider you have some healthy As and Bs in your high school results, the performance can be effectively used to carry the momentum in your college academic endeavors. And if you are a working professional, you must have already developed the skills for project management, prioritizing tasks, setting and complying with deadlines, be a strong multitasker, along with other powerful skills needed to excel in an increasingly demanding and influential college degree programs. All such things are your resources that students must learn to use till the best extent in order to achieve their goals.
Now think how you can use the available resources to counter each hindrance occurring during the term. Write down the selected resources you will require to use to accomplish each goal. Commonly used resources are your friends, family, college library, teachers, or just yourself. For instance, hiring a smart dissertation writing help to cater one or more of your particularly complex writing projects.
4. Review and edit your tentative goal statement
After writing down the first draft containing all the possible concerns and deciding if they can be resolved, now is the time to finalize the goal statement. In some cases, the initial draft may have been so well-written, that it is in fact your final goal statement. While in most cases, you might be required to put in a lot of revision.
5. Refine your goal statement
The student needs to ensure that the goal statement created is perfectly written with no margin for uncertainties and contains all the characteristics of powerful goals.