Let Your Kid Plan to Screw Up
Of course, you can advise your child to bathe regularly, never be late, eat a balanced diet, thank the customer service staff and give him real pleasure. But you can just be like a flight attendant announcing safety rules on an airplane with a broken microphone. To make kids really think about their actions and make more meaningful choices, one teacher shares this psychological technique: Have them think about how they might misbehave .
On Edutopia, Esther Park writes about an exercise she did with her fifth grade students. Before going to the art museum, instead of just studying the safety rules and watching them collapse from boredom, Park tried the opposite thinking. She asked the children: “How can we be sure that we were kicked out of the museum today?”
Here’s what happened:
At first there was silence. My students just looked at me, thinking that I had made a slip. They expected me to improve. I didn’t – instead, I convinced them that such absurdity was deliberate. Students who once lacked enthusiasm now began to smile mischievously.
One student raised his hand and shouted, “Touch everything on the display!” Another student chimed in, “We can speak very loudly!” Another exclaimed, “Run in circles throughout the gallery!”
… Then I realized that they were involved in our discussion.
Children began to analyze the implications of what they could do – how touching displays can damage art and prevent others from enjoying it. Then they came up with ways to avoid mistakes. When the children finally entered the museum, they behaved wonderfully, says Park. They reminded each other to be polite and kept going back to the discussion. “The beauty of thinking backwards is that it can captivate and interest even the most cynical and apathetic students,” Park writes. “More importantly, it can help students to honestly identify problems, investigate the potential causes of those problems, and develop creative strategies or solutions.”
Park explains how reverse thinking can work in schools. It can be effective at home as well.
Some questions you can ask your children:
- How can we make our girlfriend want to leave our house when she comes?
- How can we get rid of stomach pain?
- How do you make this room as disgusting as possible?
Our minds need to explore and acknowledge all possibilities – even worst-case scenarios – before we can calmly plan what we need to do. Plus, kids love the idea of being a little “bad,” so let their naughty minds work on something good.
“Asking Students to Plan for Bad Behavior” | Edutopia