Last year, I wanted my students to not just declare their hopes and dreams, but be empowered by them. My goal was for them to be hard workers, excited to be in school, and interested in and proud of their work as they moved towards the targets they set for themselves.

Who’s accountable?
It’s easy for me as a teacher to hold students accountable for their actions. It is not easy to hold myself accountable! I decided to attend the Responsive Classroom 1 weeklong workshop and box myself in by taking it for 3 graduate credits. This meant that I couldn’t just wish that my children would work hard towards their hopes and dreams—I had to gather data throughout the fall to see if they really were empowered by their hopes, and to make adjustments in my teaching based on the results of the data to help ensure that they would be.

I held myself accountable through three means of assessment:

Observation: I took notes and observed my class closely on September 13, October 17, and November 14;

Interviews: I took five students aside from the group on those dates and spoke with them about their hopes and dreams;

Surveys: I surveyed the whole class on November 14 with three questions; students answered by circling a happy, neutral, or sad face.

Observation & interview results
September 13: Most of the children are not thinking about their hopes at this point. School is still mostly about learning routines and guided discoveries of classroom materials. When I took individuals aside to talk about their hope for the year, I realized that I will need to spend more time explaining the whole concept of setting goals. Most answers are “I don’t know” or simply a shrug. As I become more familiar with my students, I will be able to probe for better information.

October 17: Since we posted our hopes and dreams in the classroom, students have been stopping at the display to find their names. They cannot read yet, but when they identify their names, I help them by reading the hope and dream that is hanging next to each of their names. The children are excited to point out their names to each other and will sometimes share something about their hopes and dreams as well. I interviewed five students individually again. Their answers are becoming deeper now. I find that I answer some of their questions now.

November 14: I notice that the children are not as excited about the display of their hopes and dreams as they had been, but this doesn’t seem to mean they are not thinking about them. It’s just that the hopes and dreams board isn’t new anymore, so there isn’t as much attention on it. Earlier this week, I associated a student’s degree of attentiveness with his hope for the year. I was satisfied to see him think about how his actions related to his goal. The five students I interviewed again are mostly on track with their hopes. The children can now talk about what a hope or dream is, and that really makes a difference.

Survey results
I gave my survey today, after giving a couple of sample surveys on the two prior days in order to model and practice taking a survey. I asked three questions: How do you feel about your work? Are you working hard? Are you proud of your work?

After I read each question, the students circled the face that represented how they were feeling: happy, OK, or sad. The results were: Question 1: 10 happy, 3 OK, 2 sad; Question 2: 13 happy, 2 OK, 0 sad; Question 3: 9 happy, 5 OK, 1 sad.

Most of my students were confident that they were doing their best to meet their goals, and with individual time with certain children, I think the results will become even more positive.

All are accountable
What my project told me is that even kindergarteners can relate to goals. Even though the children couldn’t read their hopes on the wall, they knew what they were. Revisiting them helped keep their dreams fresh in their minds. For some of my students, this was the first time that anyone had really held them accountable for their actions.

Next year I think I will start talking about the children’s hopes and dreams even earlier. I know that the beginning of the year is hectic, but my class’s hopes and dreams set a good context for everything we do in the year. They help hold us all accountable.


Casey Otto teaches kindergartners at Sam Davey Elementary School in Eau Claire, Wisconsin.

This article first appeared in Origins: A Newsletter for Educators, Fall 2006