Hi everyone!
I do think of goals and objectives both teaching and learning. I plan what I want to learn as much as what I want my students to learn (being it a word, a grammar point or an attitude).
What´s more difficult for me is to be precise (as I said in Chinswing). I tend to have many many things in my mind and it´s a big effort for me organise all those ideas and be concise in what I want to get... hope this course helps me in this sense.
I think it´s also difficult because nothing is static, teachers and students are not always the same, we are not always in the same mood and we grow everyday so...and our needs are constantly changing according to differente circumstances so objectives must be in constant adaptation as well.
dublinro (Dara Rodríguez)

No I don't write goals and objectives for my nomal classes,though I do do so for more individual and special sessions. Basically I 1. Do not have time to do this as I have to teach so many classes to make a living. 2. It is not expected of me. 3. The groups of students vary so much within the group it would be impossible to make a sensible plan.
However, I do discuss with them on a regular basis if the tasks we are doing are useful and ask them to bring along personal material which they need help on and may students do this.
The big problem is as a freelancer not being paid to think about the students but only to teach them.
Sheila

I don't write goals and objectives, simply because our course books are task based and the goal is specified at the end of every unit. For example, the task can be to interview a family member on a specific topic, such as childhood experiences (usually in a foreign country). In order to do this task, students must have certain prerequisite knowledge: past tenses, forming questions, specific vocabulary, etc. The lesson activities are geared towards preparing them for performing the final tasks successfully.

I always write long term goals at the beginning of the year (I share them with the learners). With reference to individual lessons, I plan them in advance, I have a notebook where I plan what I want to do in the class (when the lesson's over I love to tick all the points I covered). I think lesson plans are helpful as long as they are flexible (if something interesting arises in the middle of a lesson I don't hesitate, I change my plan)

In our massive freshman EST reading program (600-700 students), there are departmental long-term objectives and then individual objectives for each of the three courses. I make sure at the beginning of the term to go over these with my students so they do not hold false expectations about the course and know what the course will be about. I then have specific objectives for every lesson that concentrate on several strategies students need to become aware of as they practice. I then select or design the materials and the activities we will try to have in class. As Claudia mentioned, these are quite flexible and if something more rekevant comes up in class, we simply follow the flow. Many times I end up doing something different to what I had planned depending on the needs and interests of students.

Opphhss!!! I thought I was logged in to Motime and that is why I did not signed the previous comment. It is mine. Sorry.
Berta

Hi! My name is Dr. Colleen Golightly. I am an Assistant Professor of Education here at Wayland Baptist University, Lubbock campus. I currently teach the "Teaching ESL" class for our undergraduate education majors. The information for this web site has been sent to me from our IT department in Plainview, Texas (our home campus). I feel this site has a wealth of wonderful, and very useful information for my students. Look to see more conversations from me as well as them. Talk with you soon.

Dr. C. Golightly
Wayland Baptist University
Lubbock campus

I always read the goals and objectives the material in use suggests. These are general ones, so if I write G & O, it would be because I want to change the presentation of a topic. Say for example, I have a group of adults that I know need previous elicitation or reinforcement of vocabulary before starting a new topic, then I prepare additional work.
I guess I have some general G &O that I share with students the first day of class, like what I expect from them, how I like to run my classes, also this is the time to ask for the students’ suggestions, needs and interests.
I think the most difficult part of writing G&O is to make them especially for the students one has. As somebody said previously, what works with one group won’t necessarily work with another. A well conducted needs analysis would probably give us useful information so as to cater for all the different needs one might find in a group. But then, as Dara said, I too find myself trying to organize several things for each class and this can be time-consuming and exhausting!
Carolina Lapointe

Most of the times I think of the goals and objectives for my classes, and sometimes I write them. If I'm teaching a language acquisition, I usually follow the G&O from the book. If it's a content course I write the term plan and each class G&O, and give this information to my sts.

Nahir Aparicio

I've enjoyed reading the comments!
Sheila's comment about not having time and/or being paid to do it is a HUGE issue at our center. We are paid minimally for prep time and there is resistance on the part of some teachers to take on the extra hours marking and grading papers and exams, as well as taking on the administrative tasks involved with overseeing student portfolios.... I'm not sure what the solution is...except maybe paying teachers for the work done???
Most of my classes are driven by existing curriculum that we are expected to cover and to complete. The TOEFL books have the goal/objective clearly spelled out. The GE/GIE texts don't. I don't sit down and write out goals and objectives for each class. I do sit down and write out a list of topics that I want to cover and how I want to cover them. This list is based on the curriculum I'm meant to cover, taking into consideration the group of learners that are in my class... Are they the silent types and need more speaking practice? Are they at the low end of the level or the high end and thus need to have the material broken down or be provided with more challenging task?
While the program at our center is 10 weeks, some students stay for longer, some for less time, so I also have to think about who might be "repeating" the material and who might be on the "accelerated" plan. The makeup of my class changes continually, thus writing out formal goals and objectives is impractical. Rather I write out a lesson plan that I can tweak as necessary as I go along.
Gina

Comment 3 is mine - I always forget tosign. Sorry!

Nira

Regarding the children's classes I teach, as some of you have mentioned, many of the G&O are laid out by the course book. But as Gina pointed out, these G&O also need to be modified for each class and even each individual. For example, I'm just about to start a unit on the Weather with my 5 year-olds. The G&Os according to the course book are for the students to learn about phrases, a song, and a story associated with the weather. Three of the four students in the group learn very quickly and will pick up the pronunciation as well as the meaning in a short time. They'll also be able to recognize and later recall this information in just a couple of classes. However, one of the students struggles with pronunciation and he can't always remember the vocabulary we've been studying. My G&Os for him will be quite different from the rest of the group.
Generally speaking, I don't write out the long-term G&Os I have for each class level but at the beginning of the school year I do think about them in depth. I have pretty much the same groups each year, so I have the advantage of continuity. I also have very small groups so I can focus on individual G&Os. In larger classes this would be quite difficult and time-consuming.
Apart from my classes with children, I also teach two adult 1 to 1 classes. With the adults the G&Os mostly come from their needs analyses. We've had class for some time now and so these G&Os have changed over time. Every so often I'll have a discussion with my adult students about their progress and their goals to keep us on the right track.
I think G&Os are difficult to pinpoint because they're constantly changing and because there are many layers- long-term, short-term, whole class, individual... Somehow teachers have to keep all of those variables in mind when planning at the lesson level. It's amazing that we able to do this!
Micaela

I always type my lesson plans for I could see the strengths and weaknesses after implementing them in my classroom. They could be a great help for novice teachers and my colleagues, especially, I tried to coordinate with some colleagues to come up with lesson plans. In fact, there is a curriculum to be used throughout the semester.
I keep my old lessons for future use, thought there is always changes for each three years.

I always type my lesson plans for I could see the strengths and weaknesses after implementing them in my classroom. They could be a great help for novice teachers and my colleagues, especially, I tried to coordinate with some colleagues to come up with lesson plans. In fact, there is a curriculum to be used throughout the semester.
I keep my old lessons for future use, thought there is always changes for each three years.
Abdesalam

hi to all
I think one of the best things I did is to join this session. I have been teaching for 19 years and never thought about goals and objectives but now thanks to this session I am thinkging abut goals and objectives. I have two very different expeinces which i want to share with you. The first was during my work as a teacher in Saudi Arabia. I worked in an Education Collage for girls. we never thought about goals and objectives because every thing was prepared for you you can not change any thing in the set syllabus and we had to sign a paper saying so in our contract. The ministry of ecducation had a tight control on all teaching matrial all the goals and objectives where set by the ministry. I Sudan it is completly the opposit no body think about goals and objectives and even if you think about them you do not write them down. I feel a change is happening to me I am starting to think about the goals and objectives of my lessons.
Hala Salih

I usually try to have a clear aim for each course and mostly, for each class.

If I’m assigned a textbook, I’ll try to understand what its real objectives are and bend them to match my students’ needs, so that they become our objectives. Generally speaking, it’s a matter of finding a hook to suit the students and make the class/course much more motivating. Even when repeating the same course book term after term, I change the lesson plans (just like Abdesalam I type them to review and share).

If there is no textbook, after a few classes with new students I have a list of needs and wants that I organize to get our G&O. It’s very useful for assessment later, to know if we have reached them or not. But then again, like Gina and others, lesson plans based on these aims are flexible enough to sidetrack.

Béatrice

Reflecting on goals and objectives.
Being honest (as requested), yes, i definately did think about goals and objectives for ALL my classes, as i posted in my excel sheet.
I think that the overall "year-long" goal was easy, and extremely general. Perhaps, in essence, that was just the "goal" and I have to be more explicit in the "objectives"...e.g. "increase vocabulary" is the goal, and the objectives would be to list all the new words that the kids have to learn by the end of the year. So here, I have to think ...how many words is REASONABLE to have to have them learn? Should I expect 100% accuracy? 60%? 80%?
Very often, before class, I don't really have a clear-cut objective, and I mainly think in general terms. Of course, from now on, I will try differently, but, again, I feel overwhelmed by having to do so much "at once."

Linda

I dont have much teaching experience but I when I was preparing lessons last year, I set the Goals & Objectives for the course. I informed my students about it and I saw that they are kind of oriented as of where are we heading and what we want to achieve.

I think they should be written down and available for every student. It is a goal they want to achieve and should keep that goal in mind.

When you are trying to write G&Os, I think the most important question is: what are my students going to use the knowledge I am giving them for? What do they want to do with their gained skills?

Thanks all for posting your ideas :)

Eve

Personally I do not write goals and objectives, but I guess thay are so deeply rooted in whatever teachers do, that there is practically no need to do it.

The goal I always have in mind, and I mean it - always, is the final exam that students take at the end of school. Everyone talks almost only about it, so it is impossible to forget:)

Agnieszka Samojłow