The Power of Mistakes
We’re so trained to view mistakes as bad, things to be embarrassed about, to avoid. Yet there is so much power in making mistakes. We say this to children all the time: “It’s okay. That’s how you learn.” And yet how often do we say that to ourselves (and mean it)?
Teaching, in particular, can feel like a profession in which you cannot make mistakes. We earn our credentials with just a few months of student teaching under our belts, and are then given up to 200 students and entrusted with their education and grades for the next nine months. Many of us are in our early twenties, trying to establish ourselves as authorities with students who may only be a few years younger than us. The stakes feel high. The stakes are high.
And yet why would we expect ourselves to do everything perfectly the first time? We know in our minds, if not in our hearts, that making mistakes is how we learn and grow. Teaching is a skill we learn and refine by doing: every day is an experiment, coming into our classrooms, trying something out, seeing how it goes, and adjusting based on the results. And because we haven’t done much yet, we have much to learn.
If we can learn to be reflective, seeing our mistakes as learning opportunities rather than signs of failure, we take back our power and can use them to become better.
Our best lesson plans over the years have not come from our first year, and they are not brilliant activities we crafted on the first try. Instead, they are lessons that have looked different every single year because we have adjusted and revised and learned from the disastrous moments we don’t want to repeat.
And this benefits everyone. Students benefit from seeing their teachers make mistakes and take steps to correct them. They benefit from learning we all (even teachers) make mistakes and the process of learning is more valuable than perfection. Our colleagues benefit from hearing us admit something didn’t go well, yet so often, our PLC collaboration, department, and faculty meetings can be places to show off rather than help one another improve. When we are willing to be vulnerable and honest with one another, to admit we’re not perfect, we all have the opportunity to become better, and the classroom becomes a healthier and happier place to be.
We’ve shared our first-year mistakes on our podcast, Answers May Vary, and YouTube channel, and we have to say, it’s therapeutic! Consider sharing a mistake with teachers at your site. It’ll be a valuable first step toward changing our culture of perfectionism.