The Parent’s Promise

The Parent's Promise is an ancillary part of my children's book series, The Bella Santini Chronicles. However, the promise is a pillar in the work that I do. Today we will review line three of 'The Parent's Promise'

I will remind you that you are worthwhile when you made mistakes...

Teaching our children that mistakes are a part of their journey and a necessary step towards achieving their goals is an important part of raising a resilient child.

The elementary school model of this is right, and any other way is wrong, is a detrimental way of looking at things. Most issues children will face as adults will have multiple ways of approaching the problem, with several ways to achieve the goal.

My husband, Richard Kaye relates a story in which he completed a high school math quiz by writing only the answers, not showing the work. His teacher gave him a failing grade. He complained, saying that he knew the answers in his head and didn’t need to go through the steps to show his work. He then proceeded to prove it to his teacher by having her give him problems, which he then solved in his head. Because of the right/wrong school model, his way of solving the problems, whether he got it correct or not, was unacceptable. I will celebrate the day when schools accept that there are many ways to achieve the right answer, and children will be allowed to work on the problems in ways that make sense to them.

But I digress - this post is supposed to be about mistakes, not school reform. One of my favorite quotes about failure is from Edison. When asked about the many times his experiments failed, Thomas Edison was quoted as saying it only took him 10,000 steps to invent a lightbulb. He was able to see the value of each failed attempt - to learn what to do differently next time, which brought him one step closer to achieving his desired result.

Somehow, self-recrimination has become the answer to mistakes. If I beat myself up enough, I might not do it again. This approach undermines your self-worth and keeps you from discovering the value of trying, as well as the value of persistence.

What if we taught our children that each failure is a milestone on their journey? What if we encourage them to review their past attempts, find one thing to change, and try again? What if our failures were celebrated rather than punished?