So I've beaten my breast into plowshares over Yom Kippur, repenting for my wrongdoings, and am beginning to wonder about the idea of aiming for perfection.
One would think that I would be smart after all my decades of teaching, but no, I'm getting dimmer by the day.
First homework night of the Grade 5 year, I assigned some math to my students; addition and subtraction of some pretty big numbers. Next day, children came in, we took up the work. All was well in Shangri-la, or so I thought.
That same evening was Curriculum Night...meet the teacher (or for me, meet the parents) night. While discussing the use of calculators to solve math problems during question and answer time, a few parents informed me that their children had used calculators to do their homework the night before. I couldn't believe what I had heard...I had been had by a bunch of ten year olds!
Of course, the next day the class and I discussed the fact that while the calculator was going to provide them with the correct answer, the importance of the excercise was to figure out the questions on their own, to do the hard work. We talked about the fact that it was all about the process. I told them that we were going to work on strategies to help them solve their problems effectively. I reminded them that if they had problems with the work, all they had to do was ask, and I would help them to understand where they went wrong. The children seemed to understand but the incident really bothered me. I was left wondering why children are so afraid of making mistakes. Where is the pressure to get things right coming from, with-out or within? Indeed, how right is it to strive for perfection?
Don't think, by the way that this is a phenomenon for the Junior grades. Little children in kindergarten will cover up their work when they fear they've made a mistake. They'll colour over something or make up a story to cover for their errors. They just don't want to be wrong.
Look at we lowly humans. There's no way to be perfect. It's impossible. Each one of us has failings. Each one of us has faults. We know that no one is perfect. And yet, we're fearful to admit to anyone, including ourselves sometimes, that we're less than ideal. It's actually quite humourous. I understand how adults can come to these childish conclusions. But aren't children smarter than that?
We all know that there is much to learn from the value of mistakes. Great inventions like Velcro, Coca Cola, potato chips and the Frisbee were created as a result of mistakes. Mistakes propel us to push forward. They cause us to ask more questions. Mistakes, if caught, realized and redirected, help to make us better people.
I think mistakes should be celebrated for what they are, proof that we're human. And yes, I know that the idea of the High Holy Days is not to try to aim for perfection. We're only being asked to try to do better. My class simply reminded me that sometimes we put unrealistic pressure on ourselves to achieve the perfection that we know is impossible and try to take the easy way out.
I have learned that the 'calculator' of life is not the way to improve. We have to practice and make mistakes over and over again, so that we can slowly learn to figure out things on our own. It's about the process. We need to learn strategies to help us get through life's problems. And if we need help, there's always someone who knows a bit more than we do on the subject to help us succeed.
All we have to do is put up our hand and ask.
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