FAILURE

While our theme for the year is the school-wide "Be 212" initiative (see the video below for details), the word of the year for my classes is FAILURE.

Most young people today are so terrified of failure that they would rather not try at all than try and be unsuccessful. (Have you ever encountered those students in class who are "too cool" for anything?) These students rationalize that, if they never put ANY effort into ANYTHING, they can at least pretend that they never cared to begin with. ("I'm not dumb, I just don't care.")

In my class, I try to get my students to understand from day one that making mistakes is often the way we learn the best, most profound lessons! I try to get them to understand that yes, it is SO SCARY to make ourselves vulnerable - to criticism, to embarrassment, to defeat. But the potential to learn - whether we succeed OR fail! - is priceless.