How to Create a Vision Board with Your Child
I create a vision board every year. This is the first year my daughter and I are creating one for her based on her goals. She is six-years-old and in First Grade and will be seven in January. I’m excited to make this our New Year tradition.
Steps to create vision boards with your children
- Brainstorm Goals
Brainstorm with your child about what goals they have this year. Plan this around what activities they enjoy, hobbies, extracurriculars, and habits they would like to work on.
My daughter’s goals this year:
a. Ride bike without training wheels
b. Graduate from Minnow Swim Level to Turtle 1
c. Memorize multiplication table
d. Learn HTML/CSS. Create a website.
e. Dance ballet and hip hop
f. Play tennis
g. Sing and act in Theater
h. Pay attention in lessons
i. Clean up toys every day
To my delightful surprise, my daughter came up with h and i all on her own without my prompting. It thrilled me to see her create goals that she herself has decided need improvement.
2. Put together a collage of images related to the goals or images of your child engaged in the activities.
I have found vision boards with photos of myself to be more effective in developing a positive mindset, which makes sense since vision boards help us visualize ourselves accomplishing our goals.
Last year, I made a vision board with images and words but didn’t put any photos of myself. I only achieved one of my goals, whereas in other years I achieved more. Possibly this is simply a coincidence? Possibly not!
I use Canva to make my vision boards.
- Canva has a ton of photo collage and vision boards templates to choose from.
- Go through photos of the last year with your child to choose ones she wants to put on her vision board. This is also a fun way to remember what fun you’ve had together over the last 12 months.
- Let your child sit at the computer and drag and drop the photos onto the collage on her own. Canva is fairly simple to use. My daughter has been using it since she was four-years-old.
- Work with your child to add positive words and affirmations to her vision board.
3. Display your vision board where you can see it every day.
Canva has a super easy service where you can print what size you want of your vision board and then deliver it right to your door!
Print out your child’s vision board and hang it up in a place where she can see it every day.
I never learned how to set goals until in my 40’s. This yearly practice is a wonderful way to review the year and plan for the next. Goals help me make the most of my year and focus on the activities that bring me joy. The best part of goal setting is the feeling of accomplishment whenever I reach one of my goals. It is also a worthy reminder to celebrate myself.
I hope passing on this practice to my daughter will help her set goals, cheer herself on, and take moments to celebrate herself.
