Epic Fail

According to urbandictionary.com, epic fail is defined as "complete and total failure when success should have been reasonably easy to attain." In the last few years, the phrase epic fail has been tossed around quite a bit. Often times it is used in relation to something funny… like a person that is filmed having a ridiculous fall when walking down a street.

This blog post is NOT about the funny kinds of epic fail. This blog post is about the non-funny epic fail of flunking a class.

SMS is cracking down on failing grades this year. Teachers are keeping kids in during lunch to complete work. Mr. Smith is also working with students during the restricted lunch program. The entire effort is designed to eliminate epic fails (failing a class when success should have been easy to attain.)

Understanding failure is an important first step to preventing it. A fellow principal's blog (Mr. Enders/Highland Elementary/Camp Hill, PA) led me to the work of Art Markman. According to Art Markman, author of Smart Thinking, there are three main types for failure. Two of the types have value, one does not.

The first type is called The Calibration Fail. In these types of failures, there is a correlation between effort and accuracy. We think we performed correctly, but we actually failed due to a lack of accuracy. Examples of this type of failure include skipping parts to a multi-step essay answer or making careless computation errors in math. If we calibrated properly and took more time to read the problems and edit or check our work, we would not have failed.

The second type of failure is called The Edison Fail. In these failures, we take the necessary time and effort but we do the assignment wrong. Examples include writing a narrative instead of a persuasive essay or using the wrong formula to do math problems. When this happens, it is imperative that we take time to find out why the mistakes were made. Markman states, "In the work beyond school, the most successful people are not the ones who never fail, they are the ones that learn most effectively from their failures." Thomas Edison said, "I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work" when he invented the light bulb. This type of failure is OK as long as we take time to find out what went wrong.

The final type of failure is called The Bad Fail. This is the absolute worst type of failure. This is failure that results from us being negligent. This happens when we don't even try to do the work.  This is when the teacher puts a zero in the grade book because we didn't turn anything in. We didn't open Study Island. We didn't write the blog. We didn't do the project. There is no value in this type of fail. We don't learn anything from the attempt because we didn't attempt.

The Bad Fail is an epic fail. It is ridiculous to take a zero. Success is attainable. Try to complete the work. Turn in what you have. Even if you have a few Calibration Fails or Edison Fails, you will pass. Even more importantly, you will learn!

So here is my challenge to you this week… let's eliminate The Bad Fail at SMS.

Teachers, demand that work is completed. Students, be sure you pay attention, ask questions, and make a solid attempt. And students, be ready for extreme restriction if you are not going to turn in your work. It is time to step up. I know you can do it. See me if you need help.