Giving Students Space to Stumble

I was honored to participate in the Seven for Seven session – seven educators speaking for seven minutes each – during the 2018 International T3TM conference.

My flash talk was titled Giving Students Space to Stumble, in other words, allowing students to learn from their mistakes in a low-stakes environment.  I referenced Jessica Lahey who posits in her book The Gift of Failure:

“Small failures, when the stakes are relatively low and the potential for emotional and cognitive growth is high, are... called ‘desirable difficulties.’ Learning that comes with challenge is stored more effectively and more durably in the brain than learning that comes easily.”  

I argue in my talk that we want students to stumble in our class for that is how they best learn! I then share a few strategies I’ve used in my AP Computer Science-A course on how to give students an opportunity to learn from their mistakes and reinforce the message that learning is iterative.

The video of my talk is below. It's taken me a few months to get the courage to actually share the link! My slides are available here.




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