capable

I was working with a student today who was hitting a wall in math. She had been stuck on a problem for quite some time before she called me over with the words, I can't do it. Before I even walked over to her, I asked Is it that you can't do it, or that you don't know how? She thought about it for a minute, and finally said, I don't know how. Can you help me?

Have you ever thought about that? There's a difference between I can't do it and I don't know how to do it. It seems trivial, but it isn't. The former is a decision-- you have decided that you cannot do it, and you never will. You've closed the door. The latter acknowledges the fact that you might not know how, but leaves the door open to figuring it out.

Kids need to hear that it's okay that they don't get it or understand or don't know how. There are going to be lots of times that you will face something and you won't know what you're doing and you will fail. But if we empower them-- if we encourage them and build them up and show them all the ways that they are capable, AMAZING little people-- they will not say I can't. They will shake it off and admit that they don't know how, but they will reach out and ask questions and use their capable little minds to figure it out.