“Failure is not an option!”
Yawanna bet?
The current philosophy in education is that students should not be “allowed” to fail. Somehow as a teacher it is my job to ensure that kids are poked and prodded and nudged and cajoled into doing the basic work that is expected of them as students. If they say the work is too hard, I should make it easier; if it is too much, I should make it less. If they failed a test that they chose not to study for, I should consider what interventions I might employ to help this “struggling student”—a misnomer if ever there was one—reach his or her goal of being a nuclear physicist. Because, in the end, if the student gets an “F,” it is really the teacher who failed.
May I tell you why that is such a dangerous and flawed philosophy? (more…)