Assistant Principal
Tracy Skiba
Assistant Principal
Semester 1 Reports and Parent Interviews
Just a reminder that the Semester 1 Reports will be available for parents to view via Compass on June 21st at 3:30pm. This will be followed by the Parent Teacher Interview night on June 25th from 1:30pm. Please note that students will be supervised by the specialist staff and then released by their classroom teacher at 3:30pm. Thank you also for your patience with the Compass Interview glitches. This matter has now been resolved.
Following on from the topic of making mistakes I would like to share some ideas and thoughts about how we can set children up for success by allowing them to experience mistakes and learn how to approach failure as a time of learning.
Allowing Children to Fail (Successfully)
Your child forgot their homework. Again. You spy it sitting on the table by the front door, where they (no, not you) forgot to put it in their school bag. You can easily grab it and drop it off on your way to work. However, it’s going to make you late and you are going to be very stressed when you arrive at work. Do you do it?
No way, says school teacher and journalist Jessica Lahey. The author of parenting book, The Gift of Failure, Lahey urges parents to let children learn and grow through the experience of making their own mistakes. Unlike so many books out there that shame parents into compliance, Lahey writes with humour and compassion about the ways we’ve helicoptered children into fragile, dependent, risk avoidant creatures. She also bravely counts herself among the people she’s calling out: “I had to stop equating the act of doing things for my children,” she writes, “with good parenting.”
Lahey skilfully lays out strategies for change in families and schools. Left unexplained though, parents need to prepare themselves psychologically for the experience of watching their children mess things up. And that, in and of itself, is a hard thing to do.
It’s not easy to let our children be less than perfect. With the impact of social media and parenting forums I’ve witnessed with astonishment, the amount of judgment directed at parents by various experts and their parenting peers.
I’ve also noticed at least three unwritten “rules” of parenting (which are total myths) that stand in the way.
Myth Number 1:
You have complete control over your child’s development — and if you don’t, you’re doing something wrong. You’re the one with the power to make your child the person they will become — just read the right parenting books, listen to parenting talks, scour Pinterest and peruse the mummy/daddy blogs/Facebook pages etc. Somewhere in that sea of conflicting opinions you’ll find the answer to any problem your child has — and it’s your responsibility to find the right approach and make it work on the first try.
This ridiculous myth is fuelled by a cottage industry of parenting experts implying they have answers parents don’t, and it's gutted parents of their innate confidence and authority along the way.
Myth Number 2:
You can never do enough, or be enough as a parent. Even as we’re told we have all the power, we’re constantly besieged, writes Lahey, by the fear that we’re not good enough parents. Many parents live with a pervasive sense of inadequacy which leads to competing with other parents — to see peers’ shortcomings as quiet signs of parenting superiority, and vice versa. It also, Lahey writes, pushes parents to be “ever-present, ever-helpful, ever-reminding, ever-rescuing.”
It is ok to not be perfect and in fact, by letting your children see you as a model of imperfection you are giving them the opportunity to see their mistakes as learning points in their life or, as a time they can find humour in those mistakes.
Myth Number 3:
Your child’s success, or failure, defines you. There is this perception that your child is a reflection of your own intelligence and ability as a parent. This myth firmly entrenches parental egos in children’s everyday lives. It also, says Lahey, drives us to interpret the moments our children are safe, successful or happy as “tangible evidence of our parenting success.”
So letting your children fail successfully isn’t going to be a simple switch you turn on. It takes a lot of bravery and self-belief to be able to re-establish parenting routines and not perceive parenting “achievements” or “failures” through the lens of others. However, maybe this is a good time to take stock of when you, in your own life, have experienced failure or setbacks and had to dust yourself off and get back in the proverbial saddle. Are we teaching and modelling this important life skill by fixing everything for this generation of children?
Here are some strategies parents can use to prepare themselves, cognitively and emotionally, to give their kids the gift of failure.
Self-regulation, or learning to control our own difficult feelings is a big step towards this. Lots of thoughts and feelings bubble up in the face of a child’s setback, and they typically inspire us to intervene in ways we might later regret.
Picture the toddler about to spill a glass of milk, the primary school child who left behind their pillow when they’ve jumped on the camp bus, the high school student who fails to submit an important form. What’s your first reaction? It’s usually anxiety about the consequences and the uncertainty that comes along with them: worry about the huge milky mess on your clean floor, will they be upset when they realise they have no pillow or miss out on a school event?
So often parents step in not just to fix the situation, but to soothe their own emotions. We have to learn as parents and educators to calm ourselves first. What is the worst thing that will happen?
We can also control ourselves by practising mindfulness, or presence. As you feel the anxiety begin, focus on your breathing and count to five and back. Feel your feet on the ground, or your bottom in the chair. Become aware of the present moment, even for a few seconds, as a way to collect yourself before responding.
Ann Klotz, head of the Emma Willard School for Girls, suggests parents ask themselves this question before intervening: Are the consequences of the mistake life threatening or permanent? If not, resist intervening.
In her research, therapist and bestselling author Brene Brown found that our 21st century culture of constant motion and achievement makes many adults feel “that an ordinary life is a meaningless life.” Many believe that if they are not extraordinary, no one will love, notice or include them.
Brown has also said, “We can’t give our children what we don’t have.” And, she adds, we can’t hide what we don’t have, either. They figure it out eventually. That’s particularly important when it comes to letting children experience failure. If we don’t think we’re enough, our kids won’t either.
And indeed, this mentality has trickled down to our children. Many live in a persistent state of self-criticism, beating themselves up for failing to achieve some mythical state of achievement. It is a toxic cycle that never ends, leaving kids feeling that they have fallen short, no matter what they do.
To break the cycle of not-enoughness, try practising some self-compassion. Right now tell yourself why you’re enough as a parent. Are you enough because you cooked a meal this week? Because you took a moment for a quality snuggle? Because tomorrow your child may have a stain on their school top but you got to kick a footy with them today? Maybe it is time to take a moment to reflect on the day to day moments of happiness and feel gratitude for what is going well rather than shining the light on what went wrong?
I also wonder who or what is it telling us all to go faster, t
Parent Survey
The Rotary Club of Dingley Village is hoping to gain a younger parents’ view of community service and the role that the Rotary Club of Dingley Village can undertake in the future. We would like to support them in their work so have prepared a Snapshot Survey on their behalf. All information will be used to gain your ideas for the Club to make a more informed action plan. Information will be treated as confidential with a summary of findings forwarded upon request.
Please click on this link to access the survey: https://forms.gle/YzTwGWoS4WaGAT4X7