Question: "When I ask my ELs about their English learning goals, they inevitably say ‘My goal is to speak English better.’ How can I help them come up with more specific goals?"

In my teaching experience, I have also met many English learners (ELs) who said their goal was to speak English better. I believe this is a common goal in particular among students who start learning English or among those who decide to resume classes after having dropped a previous course.

Many ELs end up being frustrated and dropping out because they fail to accomplish that self-generated goal, and goals that are neither specific nor realistic end up harming students’ language learning experience. Consequently, learning to set realistic speaking goals is an essential part of a learner’s language acquisition journey. Well-defined goals will help students focus on what is important, ensure steady progress, and contribute to boosting motivation. So, how can we help our students come up with more specific goals? This is certainly a great question and a challenge as well.

The first thing we could do is help students become aware of their actual level of English speaking proficiency and establish achievable objectives from there. I believe that many of us have experienced teaching ELs who believed their speaking proficiency was either significantly higher or lower than it actually was, making it nearly impossible to set realistic goals. Helping raise awareness is crucial. You can’t reach your destination if you don’t know where you stand. To accomplish this step, we could use standardized tests, interviews, or speaking assessments.

As a second step, we could follow TESOL’s 6 Principles for Exemplary Teaching of English Learners® and try to get to know our ELs better. We could conference with our students to know about their English language goals and how these goals relate to their life/career aspirations. This exchange would provide us with relevant information to help our students set realistic objectives to successfully reach their destination. We could then assist them in breaking down this broad goal of speaking English better into smaller, short-term objectives that are specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound, following the SMART framework for setting goals.

In this way, as ELs advance in their language acquisition journey, they will get a sense of accomplishment that will motivate them to pursue further goals. There is nothing more motivating than being successful. If they achieve a first specific time-bound goal, they would feel empowered to go after the second specific time-bound goal, and so on.

Finally, we should encourage ELs to bear in mind that during their language learning journey, they will successfully reach many milestones, though they might experience some layovers to get to others. Informing learners about the average time needed to achieve advanced speaking skills is extremely important so as to avoid disappointment and burnout. Many students don’t expect to be in an English language program for many years, so we should make them aware of the fact that English language learning is a path that requires time and practice. For further support, we might decide to introduce students to internationally recognized frameworks for assessing language proficiency, like the ones provided by ACTFL or CEFR, so that they know there is research that helps understand how students progress in their language proficiency.

In my experience, working with adolescent and adult ELs, I have discovered that drawing parallels between their journey toward advanced speaking proficiency and that of a sports player, a pianist, or any skilled individual can be enlightening and motivational. Students understand that the road of any skilled sports player is made of practice and perseverance, even in the case of gifted players. The more they practice, the better they get and the more they accomplish. Each step of their journey is built on the previous step and serves as a scaffold to the next. Any successful soccer player was once a beginner learning first to control the ball, then to keep the ball and use the base foot to keep balance, and later learning to juggle, kick a goal, and score! In the same way, an EL first learns vocabulary and how to mouth the sounds, then moves on to produce simple phrases and then sentences, and so on.

I would suggest choosing a famous player who your students admire and follow, and having them find out about their success story. In my case, being a teacher in Argentina, a country where soccer is the most popular sport, I like to use Lionel Messi’s story. He is a famous Argentine soccer player who said, “You have to fight to reach your dream. You have to sacrifice and work hard for it.” Even in his case, as a skilled player, a gifted player, he has always worked hard to improve his game and has had many obstacles to face. This is something that many ELs can relate to: their road to being proficient speakers can be long and bumpy, and entail hard work, but it is worthwhile because they will be able to communicate successfully and that, in turn, will help them reach their life goals and dreams. Our role as teachers is to be there for them, facilitating their path and coaching them on the best ways to get where they want, making their learning experience as enjoyable as we can.

Do you have a question for the TESOL leadership? Email your question to tc@tesol.org with the subject line "Ask a TESOL Leader" and it could be featured in this column!

Graciela Martin is the academic coordinator in charge of the English language and teacher development programs at Instituto Cultural Argentino Norteamericano. She is a graduate from Instituto Superior del Profesorado Joaquín V. González and holds a degree in education from Universidad Nacional de Quilmes, Argentina. Graciela is a former president of ARTESOL and a current member of the TESOL International Association Board of Directors, serving as the Finance Committee chair. Her areas of interest include technology in education, materials/curriculum development, and teacher training.

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