Teaching The Tough Bits : The Good That Comes From Doing It Wrong

Did you know how much good you can do for your kids when they see you make a mistake?

I know this sounds strange, but if you explain something to them one day and make a doozie of a mistake. And if your kids catch the error. Well then they will learn something so much more important than you can imagine.

Your kids will learn that it is OK to make mistakes. And that everyone has something to learn.

Once upon a time, long before I got married and had kids, I taught physics classes to college kids. At the time I was a graduate student. I was young and nervous and filled with self-doubt in those days. The very first class I ever taught was advanced physics for freshman who were in an accelerated engineering program. As you might imagine, these kids thought they were the bee’s knees. So the first day I walked in and asked them if they had any questions from the current homework set. One of them said he had trouble with a particular question. So I looked it up, turned to the blackboard, picked up the chalk, and proceeded to plow through the problem, explaining aloud as I went.

Now as I was working through the problem I was thinking, “This is easy! Why don’t any of my graduate professors work problems out like this? I must be a genius!”

Right about then, I finished working out the problem and triumphantly turned to face the class of 40 kids only a few years younger than I. I grinned, put down the chalk and said, “There! Does that make sense?”

Well right about then I noticed that nearly every kid in the class had their book open. . . to the back. Where the answers were.

And they were all shaking their heads and grinning back. “Nope,” they said in unison. “You got it wrong!”

OK, I really wanted to grab my bag and run for the high hills and never return. But instead I stayed and tried again. (After all this was how I worked my way through graduate school – embarrassing myself in front of students!)

The moral of the story is I taught those kids an important lesson that day, although in truth I don’t think they really got it right away: You can be smart and knowledgeable, but you will always make mistakes. Everyone does. It is what they do after they make that mistake that defines you, not the mistake itself.

(For the record, it took me two more times to get the problem right and that class turned out some of the most engaged and interested students I ever had.)

So show your children your mistakes. Don’t hide them. Show them that diligence and perseverance are the parts that are the most important. And teach them how to learn by showing them, as you make mistakes.

Have you ever made a mistake in front of your kids while teaching them? Did it turn out well? Share your story!

and I linked up this post at this week’s Weekly Homeschool Blog Link Up at the Homeschool Review Crew.