{"id":47,"date":"2016-10-31T18:19:30","date_gmt":"2016-10-31T18:19:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/?p=47"},"modified":"2016-10-31T18:19:30","modified_gmt":"2016-10-31T18:19:30","slug":"professional-goals-take-risks-fail-learn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/2016\/10\/31\/professional-goals-take-risks-fail-learn\/","title":{"rendered":"Professional Goals: take risks &#8211; fail &#8211; learn"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>I was never a fan of SMART goals.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_1233\" style=\"width: 231px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.learningissocial.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/8334714234_17cb9c75c6_z.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/plnaugle\/8334714234\/in\/photolist-dGvAay-d6duSW-4EjNgb-d6duv7-nKjotH-d1VENG-nK5LjV-4XEqeW-7RxBE3-6mUf2y-o7TAAq-cmJa3q-d79SjE-8K8Y4J-gG55sU-d6duqd-fZDKXs-bozUp9-8ML8Wg-o2yj1i-fZE7ki-6dfwuo-31D6EQ-5CShDe-eiMn6X-fZDDki-q7n6Yj-8N2xDo-fZDD5Z-q13a1i-7RumUx-6B1ZVT-q14Rbe-dtfwzN-bEKdHx-bEm86H-fZE7Ba-7RxBK9-kfqFAT-q14Bga-o34dFu-766wem-abQbiw-8MPazf-5gCCxz-7RumNB-fZE7nH-dtfkei-dtfvHJ-33zZuP\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1233\" class=\"wp-image-1233 size-medium\" src=\"http:\/\/www.learningissocial.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/10\/8334714234_17cb9c75c6_z-221x300.jpg\" alt=\"001_365_01.01.2013 2013. Paula Naugle. CC-licensed (BY-NC-SA) via flickr.com Accessed Oct.31, 2016.\" width=\"221\" height=\"300\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-1233\" class=\"wp-caption-text\"><em>001_365_01.01.2013 2013. Paula Naugle. CC-licensed (BY-NC-SA) via flickr.com Accessed Oct.31, 2016.<\/em><\/p><\/div>\n<p>The idea always sounded good but actually coming up with something each fall that met the following criteria always felt very contrived to me.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><em>Specific &#8211; does it target a specific area for improvement?<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Measurable &#8211; how are you measuring your success?<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Attainable &#8211; is it achievable?<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Relevant &#8211; is it connected to your work?<\/em><\/li>\n<li><em>Time-bound &#8211; when will you achieve it by?<\/em><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>As a result, I often resorted to selecting the massive tasks that I would like to complete to feel like I am doing my job regardless of how important they felt to me personally. These tasks were so big that even though I could make them fit the SMART goal criteria, they often\u00a0changed over the course of the year and thus went &#8220;unmet&#8221; while new tasks were completed.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">This year, as the date for sharing my Professional Goals was looming I was in the midst of planning a Role of Technology workshop and came across this video by\u00a0Michael Wesch <em>What Baby George Taught Me About Learning:<\/em><\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"What Baby George Taught Me About Learning | Dr. Michael Wesch | TEDxMHK\" width=\"635\" height=\"357\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/SP7dbl0rJS0?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left\">Watching it didn&#8217;t necessarily provide the insight about the workshop I was hoping for but it did make me reflect on my own learning. Listening to Michael Wesch&#8217;s presentation made me wonder:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 30px\">How do we get students to take risks, fail and want to learn?<br \/>\nHe thinks it might be by asking questions, making connections and taking chances &#8211; that sounds like inquiry to me!<br \/>\nHe claimed that what university students really want to know is: Who am I? What am I going to do? Am I going to make it?<br \/>\nWhat makes finishing something worth it? What makes my job worth it?<br \/>\nRather than a grade, when students receive\u00a0a \u201cnot yet\u201d and feedback &#8211; they help one another succeed. It might be that\u00a0\u201cgenuine connections may restore the sense of joy and curiosity that we hope to instill in our students\u201d How can I help instill that ethos in the groups I am a part of at school?<\/p>\n<p>As a result, I considered what risks could I take to learn something new that might help me with my job and would feel like a real accomplishment if I succeed. However, I also want it to be something that as I try to learn it, I may well fail. This is what I have brainstormed so far that I would really like to invest time learning:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>How to make a &#8220;real&#8221; film<\/li>\n<li>The advantages of different programming languages that are used &#8220;in the real world&#8221; and how they work<\/li>\n<li>How to integrate makerspaces into other learning<\/li>\n<li>How to create an app relatively easily<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Funny thing is, now that I am looking up information on SMART goals to write this blog post, I see that, <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/SMART_criteria\" target=\"_blank\">according to Wikipedia<\/a>, \u00a0the different letters in the acronym have be adapted by different people to mean many slightly\u00a0different things. If I think about it this way, it feels much less constrictive:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Specific<\/li>\n<li>Motivating<\/li>\n<li>Action-oriented<\/li>\n<li>Realistic<\/li>\n<li>Trackable<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And as I reflect on what I\u00a0want to learn about, I can\u00a0easily come up with a SMART goal but first I have to consider\u00a0what I <strong>really<\/strong>\u00a0want to learn!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I was never a fan of SMART goals. The idea always sounded good but actually coming up with something each fall that met the following criteria always felt very contrived to me. Specific &#8211; does it target a specific area for improvement? Measurable &#8211; how are you measuring your success? Attainable &#8211; is it achievable? [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":168,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wds_primary_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[8,7],"class_list":["post-47","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-face-2-face-sessions","tag-inquiry","tag-pd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/168"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=47"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":50,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/47\/revisions\/50"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=47"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=47"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cohort21.com\/larajensen\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=47"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}