EduCon 2.4 in Philadelphia started last night with a panel discussion and one message from the esteemed group was “you need to fail to succeed”. Fail fast, fail often is the mantra of innovators! Too often, society impresses upon us that failure is just that, failure. However, in the world of innovation failure is required to develop, learn, and improve an innovation. One must fail in order to eventually succeed and it is likely going to take not just one or two failures to get to the end result. Thomas Edison, one of the most famous inventors, failed no less than 10,000 times and when asked by a friend about it he said “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” So, the message to teachers is let your students see you fail and see your humanity and to students learn that failure is not the end of the world. Failure is necessary and those who are the most successful innovators are not afraid to fail. Strive to fail! Join EduCon conversations this weekend at http://educon24.org/ and beyond this weekend stay connected with the conversation about the future of education.
DaNel Hogan, Guest Blogger, NEED Facilitator, U.S. Department of Energy Einstein Fellow
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