✨ THE BEAUTY OF MISTAKES ✨
Fall brings new leaves and a cooler breeze! It also brings new educational environments and milestones for your little ones. Whether your child is joining a twos program, starting Pre-K, or gearing up for Kindergarten, this is a wonderful time to embrace the beauty of mistakes.
Starting new schools and learning new skills can bring up a lot of emotions. But that's okay. In fact, it's encouraged and a natural part of life! We don't want to deny these normal challenges and adjustments, we want to embrace them and encourage our little learners to work through them.
At Wise Wonder, we celebrate mistakes because they are a vital part of the learning process. Mistakes mean that a student tried, and that is everything. If you have a child who is feeling reluctant, or overwhelmed and nervous about approaching a new skill or experience, here are a few things you can try:
- Make Your Own Mistakes – when demonstrating a skill, try making a mistake! Purposefully write your letter crooked or too big. Say “Oops! I messed up but that's okay! Let me try again!” Then fix your mistake. If children see adults making mistakes and being positive, they won't feel as nervous to try for themselves.
- Make Mistakes Silly! – Rather than simply saying something is wrong, use fun language when making corrections. For example, if your little one is working on their letter spacing and they write a letter too far above the line, you can say “Your letter is flying. That's so silly! Remember we need the letter to land on the bottom line." Little verbal adjustments like this make mistakes approachable and part of the fun.
- Read Books About Mistakes – Books are always here to help us. Whether you read about the first day of school, overcoming fears, or making mistakes, books expose children to different experiences and make them feel supported and connected.
