Just as you wouldn’t run a marathon on the day you decide to take up running, it can be helpful to break down your child’s learning into smaller, achievable goals. And what better way to do this than by setting them a target?
Setting a target is a great way to motivate your child while they work towards a specific learning goal, which is a great way to catch up over the summer holidays and prepare for returning to school. Best of all, with achievable goals in place, your child will feel a continual sense of progression, helping to build their confidence.
Personalised learning is key
All children learn at different paces. For example, a child in Year 2 may be working at a Year 3 level in numbers and a Year 1 level in geometry. With this in mind, it’s really important that each child learns at a level and rate appropriate to them.
This is where Doodle can help. By creating each child a unique work programme tailored to their strengths and weaknesses, children progress through the curriculum at a pace that’s right for them, simultaneously learning new topics while working on weaker areas of understanding. Setting a personalised goal can further help to motivate your child and aid them in working towards specific learning goals.
What kind of goal should I set my child?
Goals are particularly beneficial for children who may be behind in their learning. They can also be helpful for children who are currently meeting or working above expectations to encourage and help them maintain or progress their current standard of working. Goals you can set include:
Complete or work towards completing a percentage of a year’s learning objectives
E.g. Complete all Year 1 Objectives
These goals are designed to ensure that a child has covered and fully understands all of the curriculum content in a chosen academic year, helping to build a solid foundation of understanding to aid progression.
Move from 5/6/7/8/9-a-day to the next x-a-day
E.g. Move from 5-a-day to 6-a-day
X-a-days in Doodle are linked to a child’s DoodleAge. These goals are a great way to encourage children to keep moving forward in their learning and are especially effective at building confidence as children will be able to see the direct result of their hard work as their x-a-day increases in the app!
Achieve a DoodleAge which is the same as a child’s real age
A DoodleAge is a way of measuring a child’s overall level of understanding. For example, if a child has a DoodleAge of 7.5, they will be working at the level of an average seven and a half year old. These targets are designed to align a child’s DoodleAge with their real age.
How do I set a goal?
To create a custom goal for a child, log in to the Parent Dashboard and hover over Analyse. Select Progress, press Set a new goal and choose an end date by which the target should be achieved. Suggested goals will then appear, based on your child’s age and their DoodleAge. Select Save for the goal to appear in your child’s app.
The target number of stars that a child should earn, rather than the goal itself, will appear in the app. It’s a good idea not to share year or age-related goals, such as working towards completing year objectives or achieving a higher DoodleAge, with your child – it can be quite intimidating if a child believes they need to quickly catch-up with their peers! Instead, as you encourage them to work towards their unique goal, celebrate the fact that they are making continual progress with each question they answer.
When should my child achieve their goal by?
Whilst we would all love the ability to be able to instantly empower our children with maths confidence, we understand that this is a longer-term process. Doodle will intelligently calculate achievable goals within a given timeframe. The targets that Doodle suggests always take into consideration healthy learning habits and are achievable when Doodling for just ten minutes a day.
Excited to try out goal setting for yourself? Try Doodle for free today to set unique goals, answer unlimited exercises and more!
