Special guest blogger Janna Ellis, caseworker at Ranch Ehrlo

Goal setting is a big part of the life of Ranch Ehrlo’s youth. Right from the time they arrive at the Ranch, we help them learn to set goals. Some are long term – figuring out what they need to do to get back to their homes or communities. Some are short term and focus on the immediate – learn to integrate into their group home or developing caring, trusting relationships.

Our biggest hope is to have the youth very involved in planning their own goals, because the more that it’s coming from them and less from the adults, the more buy-in they’ll have.

We also teach our youth that goals can be adaptable to any surroundings. We help them realize, ‘ok, how is working toward this goal going to help me once I get home?’

And creating a goal to work toward changes mindsets – it gets a lot of our kids who are very reactive and in the moment, to thinking more future-oriented.

An important facet of goal planning is having a way to track progress. Youth in Rever House sometimes create goal maps, which they can use to visually see the progress they’ve made. It’s true what they say – it’s much easier to give up when you look at how much further you have to go rather than focusing on how far you’ve come.

Tracking goals is really, really important for Ranch kids, because a lot of the times they don’t get to see the success, or they aren’t told of their successes.

Celebrating success is important. Depending on the youth – some like to celebrate, some don’t – they’ll sometimes make an agreement with staff. When they’ve done really well, one of us will go out and celebrate with them, or we’ll take extra time to do an activity that they like.

But we are wary of how we frame celebrations – the reason for working toward the goal shouldn’t be solely for the planned reward.

With our youth, we very much frame it as a success. It’s not ‘if you do this, you get this. Lots of positive affirmations are used here – really giving the youth that pat on the back and encouragement when they are doing really well on their goals.

And of course, we’re here to help youth on the days that they aren’t doing so well – because everyone needs a hand up sometimes.