r/BeAmazed 23h ago

Science Learned Helplessness

1.6k Upvotes

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u/ReesesNightmare 23h ago

i was talking to an old teacher a few weeks ago and he was telling me how they arent allowed to do stuff like this anymore, after i brought up the "test" where you had to read the directions that just told you to write your name them only do questions 1, 5, 10, and 15 instead of every single one, to teach kids how to read directions.

parent claimed it was mean to expect your students to fail if they didnt follow directions

for lack of a better word, i was dumbstruck

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u/retrorefl3ctor 21h ago

That’s a real shame because my third grade teacher did something like this with our class—basically, the directions said read all the questions before starting, and the final question was something like, don’t answer any of the questions, wait for the teacher to tell you to start. I was one of many kids in the room who jumped into answering before reading though fully, and I didn’t realize my mistake until I got to the last question. Afterward, my teacher did a great job of talking us through why we did that test and the importance of reading directions carefully and fully. It made a huge impression on me!

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u/frisbeemassage 20h ago

Were you one of my students? Lol I taught third grade a long time ago and did this exact same thing!

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u/retrorefl3ctor 20h ago

Either way, let me say thank you on behalf of all the students who you taught a valuable lesson! Classrooms are for more than just academics, they’re for instilling the foundations of critical thinking skills, and learning the importance of being able to stop and fully assess a task before jumping into it without taking the time to gather all the facts is really, really important. You did your students a real service!