Faith and Hope

As many of you know, I like to think about how I can take the Sunday sermon and apply it to my life, both personally and professionally. This week, Pastor Kyle's sermon about faith and hope really struck home. He talked about faith, hope, and what-ifs. He reminded me that I don’t walk alone because God is with me all of the time.

As I’ve mentioned before, I’m a scaredy-cat. I want to do many things but tend to avoid them out of fear. My husband on the other hand is always a positive and brave man so he encourages me to do what I want to do even if I’m afraid to try it. Whenever I am very worried about doing something, we always play the what-if game. I mention all the what-ifs that I’m worried about, and he always has an idea of how to handle the situation if it ever happens. Once I have a plan, I don’t worry so much and I can actually move forward. I have faith that we can handle anything together.

I used to be afraid to travel because when I was growing up, we didn’t travel much. After marrying my husband, life was an adventure. We began traveling to places I had only dreamed about going. At the time I had a lot of worries about our what-ifs. I wrote them all down and we talked about them. Once I knew what we could do if we ran out of gas, had car trouble, my parents got sick, or we had some kind of emergency, I felt more comfortable traveling. We always have a Plan B.

Most of my students want to learn but are also afraid of learning.

When my students arrive in my classroom, I know they are filled with fear and what-ifs. It is the elephant in the room so it is important to address it early on. I play the what-if game that I experienced as a student.

• What if no one likes me?
• What if the teacher calls on me?
• What if I don’t know the answer?
• What if the others laugh at me?
• What if others are smarter than me?
• What if someone is mean to me?

Then I ask students if I missed any what-ifs and usually, they feel comfortable giving suggestions since we are talking about me and not them (even though I’m sure many of them know exactly how I felt.)

Then I ask them to have faith in me.

Once they are in my class, I consider our class our family, and I like them. They don’t have to worry about anyone liking them because I like them. Eventually, others will like them once they get to know them. A family doesn’t let others be mean to each other because we stick together.

I let them know that I am their safety net and they are not walking into the world of learning alone. I will be there beside them and help them. Whenever I ask a question, I will ask a question first and give people time to think about the answer before calling on someone. I won’t laugh at them for not knowing the answer.

Don’t worry about someone being smarter than they are because everyone has strengths and weaknesses, even me. There are things that I can’t do because I haven’t learned how to do them. That doesn’t mean that those who can do it are smarter than me.

I have this conversation often with them and I show them that I mean what I say by my actions. I show them that I care about them and that they can have faith in me and then have faith in themselves.

Once they start having success in my class, they feel that it is okay to hope. Many of my students have been beaten down by their failures and they are afraid to hope for any success. By hoping for success and continuing to fail, they don’t want to risk getting hurt. I have to show them that not succeeding at something is not a failure but an opportunity. It is an opportunity to try it a different way or to ask for help. Only when they give up is it a failure. I won’t give up on them and I want them to not give up. This involves faith and hope.

Of course, this doesn’t happen all at once. Having faith and hope is a continual process. I am constantly having to remind myself of this when I get discouraged or afraid.

I remind myself and my students that no one walks alone.

Photo by Sincerely Media on Unsplash

Don’t Be Afraid

In Afraid of afraid from Seth Godin's Blog by Seth Godin shares,

“Fear of being afraid keeps things on our to-do list forever, keeps important conversations from happening and shifts how we see our agency and leverage in the world.”

Everyone is afraid of failure and it doesn’t matter if they are a student or not. This fear is developed as a child when we are learning how to become independent. When we are learning to become independent whether it is feeding ourselves or learning to walk, we don’t have any fear of failure because we don’t know what failure is. As we get a little older, adults keep encouraging us to keep trying and keep learning. It seems like that once we enter the school system that we are measured against others. Suddenly we are evaluated and measured against what others believe are standards. As some fall behind, they can be classified as lacking in development or just plain lazy. The fear creeps in that we aren’t as good as the next person.

This fear can paralyze us from moving forward and developing new skills.

In my classroom, I want to help my students overcome this fear. I want to know that they are not alone and that everyone faces this fear of failure. I want my students to know that I will be there to encourage them and support them so that if they do fail, they will have the courage to try again. I want to teach the students how to be supportive of one another and to find ways to help each other be more successful.

Learning to be supportive and helpful is not something that students automatically know how to do. Once they enter the school system, they learn to be competitive and to try to be at the head of the class. This is when children learn to be cruel to anyone that is different. These are also learned behaviors so why not teach students that while competition is good, compassion is also a good behavior to have?

I begin by testing students to see where they are in their learning. I start with giving them assignments that I know will bring success. When they start feeling more confident, I introduce new things in small doses that I can be their support and help them be successful. The more successful they are will allow me to slowly back off the support. I still support them but also allow them more independence. When they falter, they will know they can come to me for help without worrying about looking weak. Soon they learn to look to their classmates for support and before long, they are willing to take the risk of learning harder skills. They are learning not to be afraid.

How do you teach students not to be afraid? Please share.

Photo by Jaqueline Fritz on Unsplash

F is Fear of Failure

Over and over again, I hear people talk about being afraid to try things. I believe that they aren’t so much afraid of trying as they are afraid of failing.

As we grow up, we are made to feel ashamed of failing; to see failure as a bad thing.

How many times did the Wright brothers fail?

How many times did Alexander Graham Bell fail?

How many times did Lincoln fail?

I don’t think failure is so bad as much as how you deal with it.

If you accept it, and refuse to try again or try to do better or differently, then it is bad.

By seeing our failures and working to overcome them, we are also being good role models for others to see.

I think as adults, if we make children feel bad about failure we are doing the wrong thing. Instead we should be helping them see why they failed and help them find success.

I think that is one of the most important thing we can do as adults.

How do you feel about failure? Please share.

We Have To Try

In Everyone Fails: It’s What You Do Next That Matters in Angela Maiers Educational Services, Inc.,  Angela Maiers shares,

"But everyone fails…everyone! JK Rowling’s manuscript for Harry Potter was rejected 12 times, while Dr. Seuss’s first manuscript was rejected 26 times. Abraham Lincoln lost many more elections than he won. Oprah Winfrey was demoted from her first job as a news anchor. Our children fail at something almost every day too. What matters most is how we respond to failure. Do we give up, or do we get up and try again?"

It is really hard to face failure. Parents want to shield their children from the hurt they face when they fail. But failure is what makes us stronger. If we always succeeded, we might not find something better. Life is not like that. There is failure faced every day because everyone can’t get everything they want all of the time.

Failure is a way to learn important lessons. One of the most important lesson we learn is that we have to try. We have to keep trying and never give up.

We can fuss and throw tantrums but usually that doesn’t get us anywhere. The only way we can achieve success is if we move forward. If our actions cause us to stand still or go backwards, we will never achieve success.

If something doesn’t work, we don’t just stop trying. We need to look at alternatives or maybe think about our original goal. We might need to change how we are doing things or maybe we need to change our goal. By failing, it gives us a chance to reevaluate our actions.

Sometimes trying means asking for advice or getting other people involved. We do not always have to do everything by ourselves and there is no shame in working with others.

Sometimes we need to remind each other that we need to keep trying. It is easy to convince myself to give up but it helps when someone else believes in me and encourages me to keep trying. I need to be this person for other people too. I need to be willing to give someone a hand up because I want someone to be there for me too.

How do you encourage others to keep trying? Please share.

What If?

In Let Go by Franklin Habit from Lion Brand Notebook by Franklin Habit, he shares, 

“So when students ask, “What if…” I tell them to try it. Play. See what you get. If it doesn’t work, who cares? If it does work, you may have come up with something that pushes knitting forward a little bit.”

I play the “What If…” game a lot in my life. Sometimes it keeps me from doing something I really want to do so I try to finish the sentence with “What is the worst thing that could happen?” and as long as physical pain or death is not an answer, it helps put the fear in perspective.

“So when students ask, “What if…” I tell them to try it. Play. See what you get. If it doesn’t work, who cares? If it does work, you may have come up with something that pushes knitting forward a little bit.”

Franklin Habit was talking about knitting in this post but I think this attitude also applies to education and teaching.

Many teachers are always worried about “What if…”

• What if I make mistakes?
• What if my lesson is terrible?
• What if my students don’t “get it” and get frustrated?
• What if the experiment doesn’t work?

I feel like many of my lessons ended up as experiments. I hoped it would work out and I planned it as best as I could. I took in consideration all the “what ifs” and tried to account for any of them. So what is the worst thing that can happen? They don’t get it and I have to try something different tomorrow. If I make a mistake, the students will see I’m human and not a perfect being.

Students are worried about “What if…”

• What if I make mistakes?
• What if people think I’m stupid?
• What if I look silly while trying?
• What if I don’t “get it” and the teacher gets mad at me?

I try to head off my students’ “what ifs…” at the beginning and sometimes often every week. I tell them that an error is not a terror. As long as no one gets hurt or dies, we can always redo. If people think you are stupid when you make a mistake, it is only because they are hiding their own fears and relief that it wasn’t them making the mistake. Anyone who tries something that will make them a better person will never look silly. And the most important thing of all – I will not get mad if you don’t understand it. We will just have to look for a different way to help you figure it out. We both may get frustrated but that only means that we care. If we didn’t care, we wouldn’t have any feelings about it so that is okay. We will work on this together.

How do you handle the “What ifs…”? Please share.

What I Do When I Fail

In What to Do When You Fail from Cool Cat Teacher Blog, Victoria A Davis, Cool Cat Teacher shares,

“When you lose, you only have one option. Take the challenge and change. Get up and move forward so you can win. Falling down doesn’t have to be your permanent position if you get up and keep running. Getting told “no” is just one more “no” that you have behind you as you move to “yes!”

This reminds me that someone once said (I can’t remember who so if you know, feel free to let me know) that failure is not an important thing. It is what you do after you fail that is the most important thing.

When I fail at something, my first reaction is to quit. I’m hurt and I’m discouraged and I don’t want to face up to my failure.

Once I lick my wounds and calm down, I start analyzing my failure. What caused the failure? What did I do wrong? What obstacles stood in my way?

Then I start thinking about what I could have done differently? How could I have overcome those obstacles?

When I have all these thoughts asked and answered, many times I feel energized and can’t wait to try to face the challenge again. I am determined that I will overcome this failure. I put the hurt and disappointment behind me and then I charge on ahead.

I fight the tiny words in the back of my mind saying that I will fail again or that I won’t be able to overcome the obstacles. I remind myself that not trying is worse than failing. What is the worst that can happen? I fail again and then look for another way to succeed.

A friend of mine used to coach basketball at the high school and I asked him if he got upset when his boys didn’t make a basket. He told me he got more upset if they didn’t try because you can’t make any points if you don’t try to make a basket. Just holding on the ball, passing, and dribbling the ball won’t win the game. I try to remember this when I want to keep thinking about trying and not really making the attempt.

What do you do when you fail at something? Please share.

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