How the Goal Setting Queen Came to Be

My journey into goal setting began in 1971 with a new K-8 school called Alternative School #1—a place focused on meeting the individual needs of students, where instead of giving lectures and assigning homework, the teachers would facilitate the development of the students' natural desire to learn, and wherever possible do it through play.  The school is now known as Licton Springs Elementary, but back when I began teaching there,  it was the second year of the school so things were just getting started.

Because there were no grades, and we weren't to tell the students what to do in the early days, (if I had assigned homework I would have been approached by at least a couple of parents and called a fascist!) I had to come up with a teaching curriculum that would suit the curiosities of the children, rather than trying to force knowledge down their throats. As I was planning my first full year there, I was pondering how I could give students the kind of freedom that I agreed would be great, but still help them to learn, achieve and move forward. I loved the idea of what we were doing, but it was so different from my own educational background, and certainly not anything I had learned in my teacher preparation courses.  We were inventing something brand new, so I needed a new way to motivate students that was completely different from what I already knew.  I came up with an idea:  Before school started, I began forming a team with the student, the parents and myself by meeting with them in their homes. After we had gotten to know each other a bit, I asked each student the following questions:

1. What do you do best?
2. What are three things that you want to learn?
3. How will you know when you've learned them?
4. How do you want to celebrate?

Based on the answers, I built a curriculum incorporating the interests of my students, and it was met with astonishing success. I didn't assign homework, but children had personal projects that they could take home and work on by themselves—which they did, all the time. Sometimes, parents would tell me that their children spent more time working on their personal projects than they ever spent working on assigned homework!

My work with those students was the very beginning of my work around goal setting.

After doing this for a number of years, I went to Antioch University to earn my Masters.  We worked with experts in our field of study to create a program that would help us succeed in our personal and professional goals.  I wanted to learn what the scientists had learned about the brain, what it meant for the way people learned, and delve into how it could best be used to affect quality teaching.  In my work there, I got to experience for myself the motivation that comes from working toward my own goals. I also was guided to study the research and importance of goal setting, along with many other exciting aspects of learning and teaching.  I called my program Whole Brain Learning.

Going back into the classroom, I incorporated all I had learned into my work with students, learning more and more as I actually put my new learning into practice as a teacher.

After I had taught for 27 years, I started up a side business with Legal Shield.  As a business this had many similarities to Alternative School #l.  We had mentors to help us succeed, but no bosses and no minimum quotas.  Guess what they used to motivate us (besides the fact that the more and better we did, the more money we earned)?  Setting goals! Working in this company I have learned a great deal more! I have studied Brian Tracy, Jim Rohn, among others.  I have actually had the chance to study with Jack Canfield, Mike and Steve Melia, Kim Lloyd,T. Harv Eker, and Dave Savula where I learned the importance of not only having goals, but of writing them in a powerful manner. 

As I took these courses or listened to these tapes, I was very impressed with what I was learning, and more than a few times determined that I would write all my goals as they suggested.  However, each time, I would write one or two goals while actually in the course, take it home inspired, set it in my TO DO pile, put something else on top of it, and never get to it.

That is why I have created a course where people actually get all their goals written in powerful ways, before they leave the room.  My reading of the research indicates that even if they don't look at them again (and I do encourage them to do that), they will see a great increase in their success.