Have Children Lost the Ability to Fail Successfully?

Watching the tower fall can be hard, but it can also be part of the fun!

Source: Krakenimages / Shutterstock

Nobody likes to fail; it doesn’t feel good. Trying something and not succeeding may trigger frustration, sadness, anxiety, guilt, and shame, maybe all at once. But failure is essential to learning and growth, and we can unlock the power of failure when we learn how to navigate it. Teaching our children these skills early on gives them invaluable tools for life.

Babies fail all the time. Those shaky baby hands reach for their mouths thousands of times before they can do it consistently. They babble and toddle endlessly until those first words and steps. While we continue to learn new things throughout our lifespan, childhood and adolescence are the epicenters of failures preceding growth.

All kids fail as part of growth, but children vary widely in their individual growth curves. Children who learn to speak earlier than others may take longer to jump and skip, or vice versa, and everything in between. For the most part, we accept that failures are essential to growth. As children grow and start to participate in activities such as sports, dance, or playing an instrument, we can see the link between failures and success. First lessons in ice skating, for example, are about how to fall. It’s part of the process.

Unfortunately, this understanding of failing successfully seems to get lost somewhere at the schoolhouse door. Reading, writing, and math require many failed attempts before success. When a child gets a 50 percent on a spelling quiz, though, we will often jump to the conclusion that this failure means they aren’t trying hard enough or they don’t care. The gold star for the student who got 100 percent is great for them, but the 50 percent is no less important to learning.

The child who gets 50 percent correct needs a curious approach rather than an assumption of failed effort or motivation. That failure could mean they learn spelling at a different rate than other kids in the class, but even without knowing the answers, they are still in the mix and taking the quiz. They may just need more time. If the failures persist and aren’t leading to growth—i.e., more time isn’t the answer—then we consider other possibilities such as learning differences, attentional problems, physical illness, or emotional concerns.

For some kids, every low grade becomes part of an internal identity as a "failure"

Source: Ground Picture / Shutterstock

Failure is part of learning. Trying new things—taking risks—implies the possibility of failing. Children who see failure as something to be avoided at all costs will avoid taking risks and trying things they aren’t already good at. And failure is a process, not an endpoint. When we equate failure with lack of effort or caring, students often perceive this as a judgment of who they are, rather than something they are going through. Experiencing failure as part of learning is a very different story than experiencing oneself as a failure.

Our focus on good grades, with success at all costs and failure as the enemy, creates cascades of problems. Students end up defining themselves by their grades, and they perceive even the slightest failures as an indictment of their intelligence or effort. This can lead to endless internal loops of “I’m not doing enough" or “I’m not smart enough.” And these ideas morph into fear about their future, such as going from one bad grade to an escalating internal narrative that says, “Since I’m not doing well in this class, I will never go to college, and I won’t be able to get a job or have a family.”

These thoughts and feelings can lead to patterns of over-studying to the point of diminishing returns, loss of sleep, reducing downtime and socializing, or feeling guilty whenever they do take a moment to have fun. Alternatively, it can go in an opposite direction such that a student becomes overwhelmed, paralyzed, and unable to work consistently and/or avoidant and not caring about work because it’s too unbearable to care and fail. Cheating is another response to the expectation of good grades at any cost.

Kids’ bodies and brains respond poorly to the chronically elevated levels of stress that the all-or-nothing equation of success or failure creates. Bodies and brains living with these levels of stress are at higher risk of depression, anxiety, headaches, gastrointestinal problems, and substance use. Stress is part of learning and growth, but in excess, and without relief, it harms children in many ways.

Resilience Essential Reads

Stress Plus Self-Compassion Equals Resilience

Back to School: Strategies for Starting Strong

Helping children fail successfully means redefining failure as part of growth and something to be curious about, rather than as a choice or a personality trait. To do that, we have to examine our own fears about our children’s failures. Failing successfully is part of life—at every stage. We need to teach kids how to fall so they can get back up and try again.