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| Yes | 79% | 98 votes | Total: 124 votes | |
| No | 21% | 26 votes |
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Add to FavoritesWe as people learn by our failures, which develops our character and molds us for future success. To rob a child of failure is to rob them of the ingredients they need to be a success. Liberal educators, and sociologist want our kids to live in a unrealistic world where everyone is a winner. We as adults that live and work in the the real world that is not an academic utopia, know that success and failure are all a part of life and business.
Thomas Edison: Invented over one thousand products, and yet his school teacher called him dull, confused, and unable to learn.
Albert Einstein: This great thinker dropped out of school at the age of 15 and after spending half a year of doing nothing decided to return back to school.
Winston Churchill: The great leader during World War II failed the 6th grade.
Henry Ford: This great inventor, and business tycoon, failed and lost money with his first two attempts to start his car company.
Hewlett Packard: This high tech industry giant was devloped after it's founders suffered a series of failures. Bill Hewlett and Dave Packard's early failed products included a lettuce-picking machine and an electric weight-loss machine.
Educators have told parents for years that kids must have confidence and self esteem. Most parents would agree that confidence in your own ability is important. However, the problem is the method schools have used to build that confidence. It's an everyones a winner, no leaders, and no losers strategy, that parents view as harmful to their child's development.
Even sport teams have adopted this method of making everyone a winner regardless of your skills or efforts. Some little league teams have stopped keeping score, and issuing runner-up trophies. Sport teams have been penalized if they have too many wins. Parents who have bought into this way of thinking have protested, and assaulted coaches, and educators, when their child was not selected for certain positions or achievements.
Michael Jordan once said: "I've missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I've lost almost 300 games. 26 times I've been trusted to take the game winning shot and missed. I've failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed."
Failure has developed many great men and woman, but the common factor all of them had was the spirit and character to pick themselves up from that failure, brush themselves off, and to move forward toward self perfection and development.
We can learn a lesson from nature, which is the example of the butterfly. When a Caterpillar is in a cocoon, and is ready to breakout as a butterfly,it must tear open and struggle to get free from the shell of the cocoon. The struggle to get free actually develops the wings of the butterfly so that when it does break free it has the strength to fly. If we try to interfere and help the butterfly get free, by opening up the cocoon, then we halt it's development which will prevent it from being able to take flight.
Like the struggles of a butterfly that gives birth to a new life, stumbling blocks, failure and struggle are the stepping stones a child must climb to reach success.
Learn more about this author, James Garton.
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No
Not all stumbling blocks are stepping stones, children should only be encouraged to overcome situations they are capable of overcoming. It would have made no sense for Thomas Edison to grind at school in an effort to prove that he could overcome the stumbling block of being called, "dull and unable to learn", by his teacher. He was an inventor at heart, and he probably would have made a horrible academic. Not every difficult situation is similar to a caterpillar trying to get of its cocoon, some are honestly insurmountable. Michael Jordan tried playing baseball and I'm sure approached it with the same determination and focus he approached basketball with, but he was horrible at it. He didn't continue grinding at it or punishing himself with dreams of a world series win. He stopped, changed direction, returned to basketball and won three more championships. Had he stayed with baseball he would have been a dead caterpillar, unable to break free of his cocoon. In other words, had he stubbornly looked at his miserable baseball performance as a stepping stone, it's stone that would have crushed him.
Stumbling blocks are unavoidable in the life of a child,but are more life directions than stepping stones, except in situations where they clearly direct the child to persevere. If a child is faster than most children, is athletically gifted and loves sports, but lacks confidence and misses shots or pitches, the shortcomings can be seen as stepping stones. Only because the child is clearly capable but not confident. Similarly, if a child enjoys studying and excels at schoolwork, but is also shy, socially awkward and therefore hesitant to go to school, it might be looked at as a stepping stone, because chances are the child will excel academically.
Assuming that all stumbling blocks are stepping stones means buying into the notion that children can do anything and everything. A notion that has led to many children going through immense pain and still failing. Children will succeed at what they are capable of, if encouraged to put energy and focus into it, but emphasis must be placed on capability. We must honestly admit that as humans, children are not capable of everything. Children should be made aware of the they are far more capable of doing some things than most people ever will be, and they will always be more capable at these things, no matter how hard the other people try. It is equally as important for a child to know that there are people who are much more capable of doing some things than he or she ever will be, no matter how hard he or she tries.
Some, if not most, stumbling blocks, are not stepping stones at all. They are huge boulders that will crush the child if he or she is not moved out of its way. The inability to discern when this is the case leads to failures and misery. Conversely knowing when this is the case leads the child to the things which might be boulders to others, but due to his or her capabilities are eventually overcome.
Learn more about this author, Daniel Nathan.
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