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Dear Tutors and Parents, Thank you for engaging the services of Ace Tutors. We are committed to providing you the best possible home tuition experience. As part of our value-added services, we are in continuous efforts to hand out Achievement Cards to our students and parents to assist in goal setting. In addition, tutors are also more than welcome to participate in goal setting with their students. The guide to using the Achievement Card, which is provided only to Primary 1 to Secondary 5 students, can be found below. Achievement Cards are sent within 1 to 2 weeks upon confirmation of a lesson. We hope that it can be put into optimal use for a child with a life of purpose. The achievement card is for your child to list down his Subject Goal, Academic Goal, and Future Ambition. Please spend a few minutes of your time reading the purpose of the card and how to go about using it with your child. We believe it will be hugely beneficial for his motivation.
1. One of the important concepts in goal setting is to aim high. You should have probably noticed this yourself already. Perhaps a person might have had the desire to join the executive committee of a club. If that person aimed to be merely an executive member, then nearly invariably he is not able to succeed in attaining presidency in the club. Worse, he might not even make it into the committee in the first place. This is something we want to avoid when it comes to setting goals for your child – underachievement. 2. The next important concept to bear in mind is belief. Often, your child may be shy to set lofty goals in front of you. He may choose to opt for something much easier to attain, and often they settle for less. Therefore, you must assure him he has the potential to achieve this certain goal. Studies have shown that children who are brought up in a negative environment, in which parents or friends are always negating or playing down the dreams of these children, are bound not to fare well in life. They are bombarded with hurtful and challenging comments like “ I don’t think you can do it “. “if we have tried and failed, what makes you think you will succeed?” , “Don’t you have better things to do?”. This mindset, when imposed upon the child, is extremely harmful and sows the seeds of constraint and doubt in the child of their abilities. We want you to say with conviction that he can achieve it, and repeat this idea to him as often as is needed ( at least once a day). 3. The next concept is you are strongly encouraged to apply is vision. Once the goal is mapped out, the best way to really consolidate this goal is to imagine the exact scene that will be played out when the goal is attained. 4. Say for example that your child wishes to Ace his geography paper in 3 months’ time. Get him to paint the picture of him being congratulated heartily by his teacher on his vast improvement and excellent grade. Get him to see a big ‘A’ on his geography script. Encourage him to Feel the elation and excitement of achieving this marvelous grade. The more often that this pseudo scenario is played out in the mind, the more likely it would come true in reality. Such results are well documented in the book of Dr. Joseph Murphy, author of The Power of Your Subconscious Mind. Have your child to reply this scene in his mind about once a day, 2-5mins each time for the best results.
1. There is no use in having dreams but not setting out deliberately to achieve it. Those are pipe-dreams, which we don’t want. The plan must be as specific as possible. Ask him Why he wants to achieve those goals, and the How will come naturally (he will naturally have the drive and passion to achieve those goals ). As you may see in the Ace Tutors achievement card, we encourage you to find 3 Whys from him or 2 in the least. 2. Meanwhile, continue to ascertain if he Really wants that goal. If he is only half committed, he is bound to procrastinate and never achieve it. Just like the way that if we never find doing the chores a Must, we will procrastinate until the deadline is up. You must instill in your child the sense of urgency about achieving that goal. Try not to use deadlines and threats of failure or such. Those are bottom-up approaches (punishment is one example as well). Work along the lines of “This will make your parents really proud right?” “By achieving this it shows you are smarter than all 80% of other students isn’t it?” It will mean that hey, you are not dumb in maths!” By looking up to the top and focusing on these worthy Why questions and his passions, you empower him with an inner motivation to excel.
1. Under this heading, we refer to the subjects that he is currently having tuition in. This is straight forward, start by asking your child what his grades in the subjects were previously. You may get him to set a goal in terms of grades in ‘A1’s, ‘A2’s , ‘B3’s or ‘B4’s or in certain more competitive school settings, you may want to suggest that he come in top 5 or top 10 in the paper in his class or level. We are looking at a short time frame of between 2-3 months. Some of the possible Whys that we have come across are: i) An ‘A2’ will look really nice in my report book ii) I will be allowed to play more computer in the holidays iii) My parents will not nag me so much iv) An ‘A’ would make my parents really proud of me v) I get a better bargaining position with my dad to get me a rabbit! vi) Mother will say both my brother And I are smart, not just him vii) I can beat my best friend’s score viii) I can show that I’m not science dumb! ix) I can get more daily allowance x) I can set a good example for my siblings
1. The goal covers a much broader spectrum of possible goals that he can achieve in the context of school. We can talk about anything that he may want out of himself academically: Dream Junior College Enter a good Secondary School Desired PSLE score or ‘O’ level points Top 10% student in current school Try to keep it on something that he can closely relate to, which would not normally be something like “making it into the Dean’s list”! The time frame can vary from anything between 1-10 years. A majority of secondary level students are not aware of the academic ladder at this point in time. You may have to may out the possible routes that he can take, in terms of: i) The subject base banding at the end of Primary 4, which offer Foundation and Standard levels. ii) The streams in which he may enter in secondary school: Normal Technical, Normal Academic (5 years), Express (4 years). iii) The type of pre-university schools he may enroll for: ITE, Polytechnic (3 years), and Junior College (2 years). These are the various Whys you may prompt your child with: i) I can really impress my friends if I get into a good school ii) In order to enter dentistry in university, I need to get into a Junior College in the top 5 ranking iii) I will like the joyous environment in SAJC better than in MugHardJC. I want to work a bit harder to lower my aggregate score so I can get there easily iv) This polytechnic offers the best Biomedical Science course. I want to be there! v) Since I have not decided on my specialization, would be better off studying something less specific in JC and save up 1 year. vi) I don’t want to go ITE. I must at least enter a Polytechnic! vii) From a lousy primary school, I have made it into a top 20 secondary school. I’m going to keep climbing and enter a top 3 JC! viii) I want to be able to enter my affiliate JC so I wouldn’t lose all my friends. ix) I stand a higher chance to get a scholarship in Poly/JC if my O level score is top notch x) My pay will be higher if I am a graduate of a Polytechnic compared to an ITE.
1) Discuss with your child what he wants to be in the future. Ask about the kind of professions that he wants to embark upon. Share your own ambitions with your student as well, and relate with pride! Your enthusiasm will affect him into finding his own calling or passion. Tell him about how you have wanted to be perhaps a pilot in secondary school, but in JC you thought being a financial accountant would be better, whereas in University you wanted to be a Chief Executive Officer of a company! Assure him that it is fine for his ambitions to change over time but what is important is that he aims high, so that should there be any changes in his plan, he can still achieve that dream. You need not rush your child into setting this goal. You may give him one week to think about it. Encourage him to put serious thought about this.
1) When successful public speaker and self-made millionaire Adam Khoo set a goal to himself, he declared it publicly so that he couldn’t take back his words and had to work towards achieving it. It made him become 100% committed to his goal and it generated in him a massive amount of motivation and energy. The same may be applied to your child. Urge him to share his goals with his trusted friends and family members. Hope you find this piece of information useful, do kindly share this with the tutor so that he will be able to assist to remind the child of his goals as well as have an idea of how the child should be mapping out the path to his goals. Warmest Regards, Ace Tutors