Terrible Tuesday - Learning through our mistakes and making them acceptable

So this week I discovered something terrible. I had made a mistake. I had confused eligibility to teach with the approval to teach documents, so when I went into schools to make myself officially 'available for work' in NSW, I was told I am not in the system. Oops! With all my research and hours of reading, I had not realised there were two separate forms for two separate reasons and I needed both to get a casual job. Cue the strings as I return to my computer to write the humble email back to the other schools to admit to my mistake and keep them aware that I will be available soon.

A quote from Elementary Matters in an article on failure.

Let's be honest now. Mistakes are embarrassing. Students are fully aware of this when they stutter during a presentation and hear the giggles among their peers. However, taking risks is part of growth and mistakes are a part of learning. As a result of this, we have all come across those students who will not complete work, will not start work, or will constantly be asking for either help or approval. If you have the joy of multiple students with such inclinations, completing tasks can become quite the battle and your attention stretched thin.

Let me introduce my plan for attacking risk-taking, mistake-making fears. To start out the day (with a literacy lesson), I read a Dr Seuss book filled with nonsense words. Don't you love them? In fact, here's a whole list of books with nonsense words in them for your collection. The more dramatic the reading and confusion over the nonsense words the better. Make sure when you are finished (or finished certain pages) that you ask the students what has happened? Point out that despite these ridiculous, meaningless words, they can understand it.

Next, comes the challenge for the day. They are to go and do their writing (whatever that may be for the day, perhaps in a similar topic to the book read), but they are not to ask for help! Describe different strategies they could use to attack unfamiliar words. I am sure my younger students will forever remember me standing across the room saying "sound it out and try" and turning away to another student or task. Of course, there is a time for explicit teaching, but sometimes students learn just as much from problem-solving and taking risks themselves. Remind them they can use dictionaries or other texts in the room and if you have a focus strategy already this is a perfect opportunity!

Before the students think you have totally abandoned them, explain the purpose of the task. They are to write independently, proving their awesome capabilities, and experimenting with new words. At the end of the lesson (yes, warn them of this too), you will look through students work. The most amazing words which are spelled correctly will be announced and demonstrated for the class. The 'mistake' words which are mis-spelled will be re-used, because sometimes mistakes might not be great in one context but are brilliant in another. These words will be combined in a special class story, celebrating the risks they took during writing.

What story? You have no time for writing stories? Well, luckily for you, there is a teacher still awaiting approval in a new state, and she has nothing but time for developing handy resources. Just make sure that when you choose a nonsense word for the character's name that you are consistent and use the same word. I have made the spaces for her name red to make it easier for your. So here you go!

Wanting still more support for encouraging risk-taking in your class?

A quote from Neil Gaiman that is circulating pinterest.

Check out:

• Education Week - Students Not Taking Risks? Maybe It's Us and Not Them: A challenge to encourage risk-taking in the classroom.
• All Things Upper Elementary - Building a Culture for Risk Taking: An epic blog post with suggested activities and approaches for encouraging risk-taking.
• Edutopia - Making Friends with Failure: Ainissa makes the point that certain areas of the curriculum should actually encourage risk-taking and accept mistakes.
• Anxiety BC - Helping Your Child Overcome Perfectionism: A guide for parents which may also provide useful hints for teachers.

Do you have any experience with risk-taking or students who struggle with making mistakes? How about first hand experience with making mistakes and making ammends? Please share in the comments!