Nurturing our Self-Efficacy Skills to Accomplish our Goals!

When you picture yourself in the future, what do you see? When thinking and planning for our personal goals, it is important that we have the self-efficacy or belief in our personal capabilities to find future success and accomplishment. In this lesson, we will learn more about self-efficacy and how to tap into feelings of past success in order to help us gain more confidence to tackle our goals for the future.

Elementary and Secondary Lesson

1. “Let’s take a moment to do some visualization. I’d like each of you to close your eyes. Once your eyes are closed, take a moment and picture something you want to accomplish in the future (short or long-term). What do you see yourself doing? How does it feel?” Have students open their eyes. “In order to find future success, along with dreaming and seeing what we want in the future, we also must believe in ourselves, that we are capable and have what it takes to succeed. This is called self-efficacy (write on the board), having the belief that you are capable of achieving your goal.”
2. Watch this video:

1. After watching, ask the following questions:
   • What do you think would happen if you don’t think you are capable of achieving your goals? What would happen if you think you are capable of achieving your goals?
   • What strategy did you hear in the video to help you achieve your goals?

3. Activity- Have students complete the following handout. If possible, they could pair up and interview each other to describe past success in order to foster more self-efficacy for a more positive future.

Teacher Tips

Some students may need more support with identifying a past achievement. If this is the case, have students brainstorm as a group examples from home, school, community where they accomplished something. Remember it doesn't have to be big, what’s more important are the feelings and beliefs that supported the past accomplishment.