Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi was a Swiss educational reformer who lived from 1746 to 1827. Pestalozzi’s contributions to the field of education contributed to the elimination of illiteracy in Switzerland and had a profound impact on modern pedagogy. Pestalozzi’s motto was “Learning by head, heart and hands.” One of Pestalozzi’s students, Friedrich Fröbel, is credited with the creation of kindergarten, and Pestalozzi himself is credited with the invention of the flashcard – that tear-inducing learning tool of our youth.
Over 100 years later, in 1939, Robert Bjork was born in Chicago, Illinois. After studying mathematics at the University of Minnesota, Bjork went to Stanford, where he studied psychology and eventually founded the Bjork Learning and Forgetting Lab at UCLA. Like Pestalozzi, Bjork’s work has influenced the way teachers educate their students and the modern study habits we all take for granted.
What do the two of these influencers have to do with enterprising families? Through the extensive research of flashcards and their associated difficulty, Bjork coined the term Desirable Difficulty. Desirable difficulty is a learning task that requires a considerable but desirable amount of effort, thereby improving long-term performance. Bjork showed us that skills come from struggle. Unfortunately, many of the families I speak with are seeking just the opposite: struggle-free pathways for their kids to ascend quickly to positions of influence.
It's natural for parents to want to see their kids succeed quickly, I get it. I find myself frustrated with the repetition of flashcards or trying to teach my kids basic life skills that I wish they could just “get” the first time. And on a more loving note, no one wants to see their child struggle or in tears as they work to learn; that’s normal and a sign that we do, in fact, love our children dearly. However, struggle is important, and when we rob our kids of a challenge, we also rob them of the confidence that comes from digging deep and earning the reward of determination.
Parents, my encouragement to you is simple but not easy: resist the temptation of making things easier for your kids. While you may be able to create opportunities for them, find ways of supporting your kids as they learn the value of hard work, repetition, and painful, tear-inducing struggle outside the sphere of your influence. It may hurt to bear witness to this process, but ultimately, it’s what’s best for their head and their heart, and that's something Johann Pestalozzi would certainly celebrate.
"Winners embrace hard work. They love the discipline of it, the trade-off they're making to win. Losers, on the other hand, see it as punishment."
<br/><span class="body-2 opacity-80" style="padding-top:0.75rem">~ Lou Holtz</span>
"Blessed is the one who perseveres under trial because, having stood the test, that person will receive the crown of life that the Lord has promised."
<br/><span class="body-2 opacity-80" style="padding-top:0.75rem">~ James 1:12</span>
"Don't worry that children never listen to you; worry that they are always watching you."
<br/><span class="body-2 opacity-80" style="padding-top:0.75rem">~ Robert Fulghum</span>
