How to Teach Children to Celebrate Failures?
- Updated on 06 Mar 2020
- Child Learning
- Indrani Raha
Contents
Introduction
Failure is only the opportunity to begin again more intelligently.
Henry Ford, Founder, Ford Motor Company.
As a parent today, I admit that the education system has failed to teach our kids how to learn from their failures and grow from them. The school system and education, for the most part, conditioned our children to avoid and fear the negative consequences of failures. Their lower grades in bold red, the disappointed look of their teacher, and the worrisome talk from most of the parents who expected more have been telling the young minds how their future depended on their good marks; all added up to make them fear and resent failure more.
Good intentions, though, but the teachers and parents have never realized that the result would be their inability to cope with failures later in life and learn and grow. For example— we cannot resist if our children get their multiplication tables wrong or not become part of the school’s sports team, or not be selected for an annual concert. As a result, they also feel a sense of failure when a friend suddenly stops talking to them, or no one listens to them. Success and failures are a natural part of life, and it has always been that way.
While success brings a lot of joy and happiness, failure can set back a person—children included— with agony, fear, anger, pain, sadness, frustration, and low self-esteem. How one reacts to both situations completely depends upon age, experiences, and maturity. Our kids are of a generation that can’t handle losing. At party games, school, and even friendly neighborhood contests, we see kids bursting into tears because they “did not come first.” We must prepare our kids to face and celebrate failures. But how to teach our children that mistakes are okay? Come, in this post, we are here to discuss that.
How to Train Children to Accept Failures
It all depends on our reaction to their failure. Our kids always look up to us as examples, and how we react will influence their response to that situation.
Helping children learn from failure is crucial to developing them as a person. All of us know that any situation which may seem trivial at first might grow into a major crisis for children at a later stage.
However, the good news is children can be trained to deal with failures. This will help them manage stress and disappointments.
Teach them to celebrate failure
People fail all the time. Some of the greatest people in history rose to glory backed by the conviction that they had the potential to do good. Read this failure list, and you will get an idea of how the people mentioned in this list worked hard on their failures to become people that others would follow.
Another point you have to remember is that every fall has a lesson because it shows children where they failed, where they can improve, and where they can stretch. For children, learning from failures is more important than getting good grades.
Every time your child fails, show him the positive side of the failure. Tell him that the effort was more important than failure. They also need to understand that they should ask for help every time they fail, try new strategies, and understand where they went wrong. This way, they will learn to celebrate failures.
Share your own experience with failures
In this exceptionally challenging world, the preconceived notion that ‘success is everything needs to be modified. We need to teach them to accept fall and adopt it as a learning tool of our life. Rather than showing our children success stories of famous personalities, we can groom them with the stories of fall and let them be close to reality and accept failure gracefully. Entale your own personal failure stories of your life. Why should we keep it a secret? Let our children learn from our failures too. This would have a profound influence on them, and as a result, they will never fear failures and handle them with a stormy brow of intensity.
Brief them on the difference between “I fail” and “I am a failure.”
If your child calls himself a failure, that means he has decided to quit and is not ready to bounce back. Help them to understand the difference between ‘I fail,’ that’s okay because he says this, then it means that he /she is ready to accept failure as a part of their life and move forward with a bang. This would help them make a drastic change in their life, and they can quickly come out of the shackles of failure.
Turn your child’s failures into a success story
As soon as you or your child identify a failure, turn it into a success story. Tell your child that it was not a failure but was done in the wrong way. You have to stay with your child when he’s not successful—whether at school or elsewhere, so that you can talk him out of the feeling of failure. If possible, you can often learn from mistakes at home, such as re-write their exam papers without fear at home, reciting and telling a story or a poem that is his favorite, and ask your child to participate. This will slowly reduce their fear of failure.
Don’t judge any failure
Don’t criticize your children for failing, or don’t compare their failures with another child’s success. Listen to everything they say unconditionally and without prejudice. Also, don’t be blunt on their face. Tell it in a very subtle way so that you don’t hurt their feelings.
Tell your child that it’s okay to ask for help
While you must help your child do things on his own, you must also tell him that it’s okay for him to seek help if he falters along the way. He can seek help from his fellow students, teachers, neighbors, parents, cousins, or just about anyone he is comfortable with.
What your Child Learns from Failures?
Failures are not the end, and neither is it the end of efforts. While winning has its rewards, failures too show us that there are other better ways to do something. Every businessman, leader, or sportsperson today comes up through sheer hard work and by learning from failures. They have taken the failure in their stride and moved on. They have celebrated their failures and have publicly spoken about them. It’s only through trying and failing, then trying again and succeeding, that children can learn about their accomplishments.
Encouraging and praising them even when they fail is one of the most effective ways to ensure children celebrate their failures. Both of these are also powerful tools and effective for all ages. Just remember one point- Numbers won’t make our children superstar. How they deal with life and handle problems gracefully makes them a superstar of life.
Conclusion
We as parents should work together in educating and celebrating our children’s failures. Only then can we thrive successfully and make this world a better place to live.
After all, why should failures stop our children from enjoying the rain? Isn’t it?
So what’s your child’s learning from a failure lesson plan? Do let us know in the comments section below!
You can also take a look at:
5 Fun Reading Games and Activities for Kids that teachers need to know
