Winning at Planning: Step 2

Uh oh, I've lost you already. I have yet to meet anyone who enjoys talking about objectives and goals. First, let's learn the difference between the two because they are not interchangeable. Goals are broad and long term. Objectives are specific and short term.

Example:
Goal: I want to enjoy running.
Objective: I want to run a 5k by January 2013.

When you hear about people setting homeschool goals, you might think they are sitting down and making a list of everything their child is going to learn in every subject. Yuck! That just sounds painful, not to mention unnecessary. This is the time to think BIG PICTURE! The objectives will come later and hopefully from the curriculum you purchase.

Why bother writing these down? Once you establish the goals for your homeschool, it will be like someone has handed you a map! You can spend years and thousands of dollars on materials that don't line up with your goals. If you don't know what you stand for and what you are working towards, you will be poorly equipped to face that stack of curriculum catalogs. For example, I was looking at one particular science curriculum that is very popular. I was almost ready to buy it when my husband came across something in the book that didn't match up to our goals. If I was willing to go with what is popular, I'd be willing to sacrifice our goals.

Once you've established your goals, type them up, print them out and put them someplace where you will see them. Good luck!