Every spring, science teacher, Andy Lammers, requires his students to design, build, and launch rockets powered by water pressure that must deploy a parachute to land an egg so gently that the egg does not crack. The project is one of several dozen project-based learning opportunities that our students encounter in middle school. A couple of weeks ago, I asked one of our eighth graders how his water-bottle-rocket launch went. His casual, matter-of-fact reply, “not very good, but it was only our first launch,” may seem less than momentous, but, truly, those words are a distillation of a mindset and attitude that we we are purposefully instilling in our students. Teaching our students to be resilient, to overcome setbacks and know that some level of success will ultimately be achieved, is one of our most important tasks.
It is self-evident that for students to overcome obstacles, they must encounter obstacles at school -- and the obstacles that they encounter must be real, valid, and purposeful. Also, the obstacles must be stiff enough to create cognitive dissonance, but they also must be ones that can be scrambled over, pushed aside, or blown up. In many schools, some students experience academic obstacles every day that are too huge to even attempt to conquer, and then some students rarely experience even the smallest setbacks. Differentiating to provide learning opportunities that challenge each student at a level where success can be achieved through perseverance is not too difficult, but it takes a recognition that developing resilience can be a more important goal than learning subject content. If teachers plan lessons believing that the foremost goal is for students to learn resilience and the secondary goal is to learn subject matter, then the methods employed will be different. Project-based learning, Paideia seminars, and writing workshops are examples of methodology that offer opportunity for all students to be challenged, while still learning content and skills.
Students must also be given the opportunity to improve or change in order to develop resilience. To accomplish this, there must be chances for the student and others (peers, faculty, friends, family) to observe trials and attempts, and there must be the opportunity for do-overs. To be most effective, there should be no stigma against failing other than the recognition that the student needs to improve and the recognition of ways that the student can improve. When true formative assessment becomes institutionalized, it changes the entire dynamic of a school community. Schools become focused on learning, not “playing school” to achieve grades and other clumsy attempts to quantify learning.
I have referred to the words written on the whiteboard in my office several times in my writings: reflection is the key to change. While reflection is somewhat inherent in all formative assessment, it needs to be given a bigger role. Students need to be required to analyze and make judgements about their attempts and struggles either in writing, discussions, videos, drawings, or charts. They should do this both individually and with others, formally and informally. They should observe what others have done so they can apply learned techniques to their attempts, but they should also be encouraged to try new, inventive ways to solve problems and express themselves. This freedom to be creative and innovative can be institutionalized when divergent thinking is recognized and rewarded.
“Not very good, but it was only our first launch.” What if we could teach every child in this country to have the attitude inherent in this statement -- to know that immediate setbacks will be overcome, to find problems and look for solutions, to aim for long term success, and to know that it will take work and struggle to achieve something worthwhile?
