Teaching children that it’s okay to fail can help them develop resilience, confidence and a growth mindset.
This article shares practical ways parents can help children handle setbacks, including normalising failure, sharing personal experiences, encouraging self-reflection, celebrating effort, setting realistic goals and providing a supportive environment. The key message is simple: failure isn’t the end, it’s feedback that helps us learn, grow and try again.
- Normalise Failure
- Share Your Personal Failure Stories
- Encourage a Growth Mindset
- Set Realistic Expectations
- Give Them Positive Reinforcement
- Give Them Constructive Feedback
- Encourage Out of School Activities
- Mentorship
- Failure is Not Final
- Create a Supportive Environment for Them
- Encourage Resilience
- Congratulate Them for their Effort and Progress
- Use Inspirational Examples
- Encourage Them to Self-Reflect
- Promote Perseverence
- Tell Them not to Compare Themselves to Others
- Key Takeaways
Each year our children face new challenges, opportunities, successes, failures and navigating life’s obstacles.
Some are moving from junior to senior school.
Some are moving into their GCSE year.
Others from GCSE to 6th form and A levels
Others are off to Uni.
And this got me thinking – how do we prepare our children for life’s upheavals? So, I’ve put together a few tips you may find helpful for your children to manage failure.
Normalise Failure
Tell them:
- failure is a natural part of life. Everyone faces setbacks and makes mistakes at some point. It’s not a reflection of their worth but an opportunity to learn and improve.
- there is no such thing as failure only feedback
- failures are our teachers.
Share Your Personal Failure Stories
Tell them about when you failed at something, and how you learnt from those failures, which enabled you to move forward to success. This makes you more relatable to them and shows that even adults face challenges and setbacks.
Encourage a Growth Mindset
Teach them about the concept of a growth mindset, where abilities and intelligence can be developed through effort and learning. Emphasise that failure is a stepping-stone on the path to improvement and thereby future success.
Set Realistic Expectations
Help them set goals that are not only do-able but achievable. Unrealistic goals can lead to failure and hence not only a fear of failure but a “never even attempt” attitude. Break larger goals into bite size and manageable steps to reduce the fear of overwhelming failure.
Give Them Positive Reinforcement
When they do fail, offer positive reinforcement. Praise their effort, resilience and the lessons they’ve learnt rather than focusing on the failure itself.
Give Them Constructive Feedback
Teach them how to analyse their failures constructively. Encourage them to ask questions like “What went wrong?” “What did I do wrong?” and “How can I do better next time?” This promotes a problem-solving attitude.
Encourage Out of School Activities
Encourage teenagers to participate in extracurricular activities they are passionate about because these often involve challenges and setbacks, which are excellent learning tools.
Mentorship
If you can, get them in touch with mentors, coaches or role models who can share their experiences with their own personal failures and successes. Hearing from others can be inspiring and educational.
Failure is Not Final
Emphasise that failure is not the end of the road but a detour to success. They can always reassess, adjust their approach and try again.
Create a Supportive Environment for Them
Give your children an environment where they feel safe to take risks and make mistakes without fear of harsh judgment. Let them know that you are there to support and guide them.
Encourage Resilience
Teach them resilience by helping them bounce back from failure. Discuss strategies for managing stress, setbacks and disappointments.
Congratulate Them for their Effort and Progress
It’s so important to congratulate not only their successes but also their efforts and progress. Recognise their hard work and determination regardless of the outcome.
Use Inspirational Examples
Share stories of famous individuals who faced multiple failures before achieving success. Highlight that many successful people attribute their growth to their failures.
Encourage Them to Self-Reflect
Encourage them to keep journals or engage in self-reflection exercises. This helps them process their experiences, identify patterns, and set goals for improvement.
Promote Perseverance
Emphasise the value of perseverance and the idea that success often comes to those who keep trying, even in the face of failure.
Tell Them not to Compare Themselves to Others
Comparing ourselves to others’ success is a road to anxiety and failure. None of us look like each other on the outside, so why should our abilities be the same as each other. Each one of us has our own individual special strengths and these should be embraced, cultivated and encouraged.
It’s not important that we fall down, what is important is that we dust ourselves off and carry on, on the learning journey road, adjusting our behaviour flexibly to achieve the desired result.
Simply by actioning these tips you can help your children to develop a healthier perspective on failure, allowing them to embrace it as an opportunity for personal growth and resilience-building.
And lastly emphasise that “There is no such thing as failure only feedback”. This will help them to learn, grow and flourish.
If at first you don’t succeed, try and try again.
I do hope you’ve found this helpful – should you have any questions please don’t hesitate to ping me.
Key Takeaways
Teach children that failure isn’t something to fear, it’s an opportunity to learn, grow, build resilience and try again.
