How Children Fail
by John Holt
Reviewed by Kah Ying Choo
In his groundbreaking
John Holt, draws
upon his observations of children both in school and at play to identify
ways in which our traditional educational system predestines our young
people for failure.
Holt argues that children fail primarily "because they are afraid, bored, and
confused." This, combined with misguided teaching strategies and a
school environment that is disconnected from reality and "real
learning", results in a school system that kills children’s innate
desire to learn.
The following is a summary of the author’s conclusions:
1. Fear and failure: Schools promote an
atmosphere of fear – fear of
failure, fear of humiliation, fear of disapproval - that most severely
affects a student's capacity for intellectual growth. External
motivation – rewards such as grades and gold stars – reinforces
children’s fears of failing exams and receiving disapproval from the
adults in their lives. Rather than learning the actual content of
the lessons, students learn how to avoid embarrassment. This
atmosphere of fear not only quells a child's love of learning and
suppresses his native curiosity, but also makes him afraid of taking
chances and risks which may be necessary for true learning to occur.
2. Boredom: Boredom serves as
another major obstacle, blocking
both the child’s innate motivation to
learn and his love of learning. Before attending school, children
feel free to explore and discover those things that interest them.
But once the child becomes part of our modern school system, both the
institutions and the parents unknowingly sabotage their child’s
education. Schools demand that children perform dull, repetitive
tasks which make limited demands on their wide range of capabilities;
such demands may or may not be suitable to a particular child’s
interests or needs.
Schools provide a ‘cookie-cutter’
education, which compels
children to vie "for petty and
contemptible rewards," rather than cultivate their intrinsic love of
learning, which would serve to enhance their individual gifts and
talents. Rather that forcing our children to adapt to a system
which makes them consider learning a dreary and painful task, Holt
advocates that children be encouraged to learn by following their
natural curiosities and interests, without fear and guilt.
3. Confusion: Once enrolled in
school, the child often founds himself being taught things
that contradict what he has learned from his parents or other adults.
Furthermore, the adults at school treat him very differently than the
ones at home. This confusion is further exacerbated when a child,
who is taught at home that curiosity is a positive and commendable
thing, faces mockery and contempt from both teachers and fellow
students for asking a question. Through his research, Holt has
observed that most children – largely for fear of such ridicule – cease
to ask questions by age ten.
4. Real Learning: Holt believes that "real learning" does not necessarily
equate to mastering the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic, but
rather, occurs when a child is encouraged to develop his own gifts and
talents. Every expert has different views on what should be
included in a child’s curriculum, and furthermore, much of what is
taught in our schools is outdated by the time children need to apply
that knowledge to real life. This reinforces Holt's belief that
there is no single body of information that all children should learn.
Quoting the author: "The proper place and best
place for children to learn whatever they need or want to know is the
place where, until very recently, almost all children learned it:
in the world itself."
Current teaching strategies cultivate a fear of
humiliation in children, and do more to harm young people than they do
to meet their needs. Such fear drives students to develop various
coping strategies or defense mechanisms - mumbling, acting like they
don't understand, acting overly enthusiastic so they won't be called
upon, etc - to dodge the demands placed upon them by adults, or to avoid
being humiliated in front of their peers.
that there is a vast difference between what children really know, and what they only appear to know.
Rather than learning the content of a lesson, children learn how to
perform, or how to survive by deflecting the teacher’s questions with
the least possible amount of embarrassment. Almost everything we
do in our schools tends to make children ‘answer-centered,’ rather than
‘problem centered,’ which inadvertently deprives them of the skills that
they need to function in the real world.
From the time of
birth until the age of three years, children have a
"tremendous capacity for learning, understanding, and creating."
Adults – either through their own actions, or through excessively
dictating their children’s actions - destroy most of the this
intellectual and creative capacity. Most frequently, we destroy
this capacity by making our children afraid; afraid of being wrong.
Holt’s examination of our present educational system is a critical and
insightful study, one which forces us to look more closely at the
lessons that we are unwittingly imparting to our young ones.
Holt, J. How Children Fail - Classics
in Child Development (September 1995) Perseus Pr; ISBN: 0201484021
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