Student Driven Goals with Eureka Math

When it comes to motivating students to learn, we as teachers definitely do all that we can to be creative, prepared, and engaging. 
 
When we foster student driven motivation though, that is the ultimate key! 

​When students start pushing themselves, we will see dramatically different results than us being the driving force.  

Setting Goals
 
As I have mentioned before, students are driven when they are competing with themselves.  When we use the timed Sprints for fluency practice, and students see how far they have  made it in that time - they want to push to reach a higher goal next time!

 
We also know that the learning targets set at the beginning of the lesson give students a mental goal to strive for during the lesson and what to check for at the end of the lesson..
 
However, the key element to bring this all together and having students set goals is a self-assessment.  If students continue to wait for the teacher to do all of the assessing, they will always feel like they are disconnected from what their performance was and the score that was given.  They may even feel like it's the student vs the teacher platform rather than a team approach.  
 
Provide students a way to self-assess their own work and progress and watch the turning point occur.  Students will begin seeking you out for guidance and support in what they are going to do to improve.  The teacher becomes the supporter rather than the dictator. 
 
How to Create Self-Assessments 
 
Create self assessments by using the learning targets you set for the lesson concept development.  Make a list of learning targets for the students to use throughout the unit.  Type these targets up in a list format.  Next to each target, provide numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4.  Each number is a rating of how they feel they rated at this learning target.  If they circle 1, it means they do not understand the concept, 2 means working toward understanding, but still have some questions, 3 means yes, they understand it, and 4 means yes, they understand it and could teach it to someone else.  
 
Provide a chart paper describing each number rating and display it in the classroom for students to easily refer to when they self-assess.
 
How to Incorporate the Self- Assessment into Lessons
 
After each exit ticket at the end of a lesson, have students give themselves a score on the self-assessment.  This can be kept in a folder and not shared with anyone else.  As the teacher, provide check in support and feedback in a conference about how students feel the lesson went.  Record the data for yourself to plan small group intervention or whole group instruction as follow up to support students in need.

How Students can Revise the Self-Assessment
 
Students can revise the score they gave themselves when they feel differently about that learning target.  After another lesson, they may want to change that score.  They see the growth and they are in control of deciding that they deserve a better score.  
 
This is also fuel for awesome conversations.  Sometimes students choose to score themselves between a 2 and 3 and provide support with how they feel with examples of their work.  
 
As students reach a 4 in learning targets, they have reached those goals. They may focus more now on learning targets where they need more support. You can provide activities in centers or small groups to help students have opportunities to raise the score.
 
Students can Create Their Own Goals
 
After students have been working with your support and as a class foe a while using learning targets to self-assess their own learning, they can begin to create their own. Provide students a template with blank spaces and the number rating scale. Allow students to create a target for themselves after the introduction of a lesson. In the same lesson, some students may strive to reach a goal in computation while another may know they need to reach a goal in problem solving.
 
When the students are in the lead of setting goals and reaching them, they will feel motivated and happy in their learning. Eureka Math incorporates so many mathematic components into one lesson. After setting multiple learning goals, the students will understand that it is not just one skill being utilized in each lesson, but a combination of multiple strategies.