British teacher James Nottingham’s concept of “The Learning Pit” was born after he observed that students like to play it safe in class raising their hands only when they are sure of the answers.

Journalist Jenny Anderson noted that “In Japan teachers spent 44% of their time giving students material they don’t know and challenging them to figure it out.”  U.S. teachers tried this approach 1% of the time.  Struggling to solve a problem was actually good. This does not mean that offering help is not good or intervening when panic sets in is not appropriate.

The same appears to be true for adults.  The more we struggle, the more we learn.  Sometimes failing has its advantages and helps us succeed later.  I wrote a book about this topic that we use in my college stress classes – Out of Bad Comes Good – the Advantages of Disadvantages – how people as diverse as Steve Jobs to Mother Teresa turned failure into success.

Fear of failure is the enemy of resilience.

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