12 Awesome Hacks To Meet Your SMART Goals in Spanish

Using SMART goals in Spanish is a great strategy to help you keep track of your language learning progress and focus your efforts on relevant subjects.

Whether it is regarding a work, school, or neighborhood meeting, or even a politician’s press conference, you may have wondered why nobody talks about a way to measure and verify how the participants will achieve the offered goals and promises in real life. 

Well, someone invented an effective way to do this—I’m talking about SMART Goals. 

What are your goals in Spanish? I’m sure that whatever they are, learning about SMART goals will help you achieve them more effectively. Keep reading to learn what SMART goals are, who created them, what different versions are there, and how you can use them in Spanish.  

What Are SMART Goals?

SMART goals are a goal-setting technique widely used in the business world as a motivational tool to achieve desired corporate results. 

SMART is an acronym that stands for the following. 

• Specific
• Measurable
• Assignable
• Realistic
• Time-related

History and Origins

The corporate world has been interested in improving the achievement of set goals. Business environments require ways to ensure the accomplishment and measurement of results. 

In 1981, consultant George T. Doran, wrote a paper titled “There’s a S.M.A.R.T. Way to Write Management Goals and Objectives.”

The idea caught up quickly and expanded through the business world, as it was easy to remember, and it also set a series of clear and measurable standards for goals. Slowly but steadily, the SMART goals system started expanding outside of the corporate world into other areas of human interaction including education, sports, politics, and life coaching.

Different Versions

A quick search on the internet will show you that there are different versions of SMART goals. For example, one of the most common versions changes the original acronym words for Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Timely. 

In this case, “Achievable” is basically the same as “Realistic,” and “Timely” is the equivalent of “Time-related,” while “Relevant” was added to avoid the issue with “Assignable” when talking about personal goals (if you’re using SMART goals for personal projects you will always be the “assigned” person). 

From here, I’ll be using this version of SMART goals as they fit the purpose of learning a language better, switching the label from “Assignable” to “Relevant.”  

How To Use SMART Goals in Spanish

The first thing you need to do is to sit down and say, “my goals in Spanish are…” In other words, ask yourself why you want to learn Spanish, why you have embarked on this language learning process, and what you hope to achieve by learning this language. 

Once you have those answers at sight, it will be easier to set SMART goals that will help you to get where you want to go. 

Create Your Own SMART Goals in Spanish

Now it’s time to create your own SMART goals in Spanish. I’m providing you a SMART goals template in Spanish that you can print and follow step by step to set your own goals according to your specific level and personal situation. 

SMART Goals Template

Remember that your SMART goals in Spanish should meet the following criteria.

Specific 

A SMART goal has to be set into well-defined boundaries and not trying to cover a lot of different areas. If you try to cover too much, you’ll get in trouble when you try to measure the progress of that goal. 

Asking yourself the 5W questions (who?, what?, where?, when?, and why?) helps you to limit the scope of your goal and make it specific to the detail. 

Example: verbs (meaning). 

Measurable

This is perhaps the most important element of any goal, not only SMART goals. If you can’t measure the progress of your goals, then it becomes quite hard to determine if you’re actually achieving something with your efforts. 

Look for measurable indicators that can help you keep track of your progress. You can ask yourself how much or many of that particular thing you want to achieve. 

Example: 40. 

Achievable

The idea of setting SMART goals in Spanish is to help you achieve your end goal of becoming fluent in the language at some point in the near future. Setting smaller, specific goals, and possible goals, help you to measure your progress and keep motivated. 

However, if you set impossible goals, the result will be the opposite as you’ll lose your motivation when you realize that you can’t achieve the goals you set. The problem would be that your goals are possible to achieve. Set realistic goals to keep you motivated and progressing.

Example: Is learning the meaning of 40 verbs “achievable?” Well, that will depend on the timeframe you set for it.

Relevant

SMART goals for Spanish class should be relevant to your end goal, which is to become fluent in Spanish. Make sure to set important goals that actually add value to your language learning process.  

Example: Is learning verbs relevant to your end goal of becoming fluent? Yes. 

Time-related

If you don’t set a timeframe to achieve your goals, you risk losing interest and leaving them in a limbo. Set goals in Spanish that respond to a specific timeframe, as that gives you a reference point and pushes you to keep advancing in your language learning efforts. In other words, deadlines help your mind to focus, and avoid procrastination. 

The question you need to ask yourself here is, “when? or how often?” 

Example: Per month. Learning the meaning of 40 verbs per month means that you have to learn 10 new verbs every week. That’s more than enough time and it makes your goal quite achievable. 

Example of a SMART Goal in Spanish: Learning the meaning of 40 new verbs per month. 

Use SMART Goals and Improve Your Spanish

Using SMART goals in Spanish helps you to sharpen your focus and keep track of your language learning progress. You’ve already learned how to set them as all you need to do is answer some questions to help you define your goals and keep them effective. 

Crush your SMART goals in Spanish today! Start learning Spanish in a 1-on-1 setting with our certified Spanish teachers from Guatemala at HSA. We teach more than 24,000 actively engaged students every month and have been doing it for over 10 years. Sign up for a free class today!

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