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Middle School science teacher Mo Poxon explains,  “At Marin Horizon, we give kids a safe space to fail spectacularly and learn from that. It’s one of the things I love about the teaching philosophy here.” 

As a reminder that failure is not something to fear, she has created the Wall of Epic Fails in her classroom.

“To be clear,” explains Mo, “we are not striving for failure, but neither do we want students to be afraid of it.” That’s why she created the wall about ten years ago. 

“I think in education in general, truly, kids are often afraid to try things. They’re stuck because they’re afraid of failing, afraid of looking bad, or getting a bad grade or whatever that fear of failure involves.”

The current wall features unsuccessful wind turbines, elements from Rube Goldberg machines, and remnants of a neural network. All those designs were epic fails. They illustrate examples of shoddy engineering, hours of student frustration, and lack of planning and design. Things that almost all inventors and engineers experience. Ultimately most of the kids, through tenacity and determination, went on to produce winning products or solutions.

Failure hurts, but that’s the point. That pain helps you learn more deeply.

So what’s it feel like to fail, and how does that help us learn? Mo explains that mistakes actually impact your limbic system. They spark a bit of the brain, creating a little emotional frisson, so that when you do find success, you’re more likely to remember it because of that pain of disappointment. It literally activates part of the brain that helps learning and retention.

Eighth grader Griffin described a recent science and engineering project – a Rube Goldberg Machine – that tested his resolve. “Every single time we tried it, over and over again, no matter what we did, [one element] would always fall too early. It took us over a week to get it to finally work!” 

We asked him, Was this a valuable process? Griffin responded, “Yeah, I think it was. We really liked our machine and since we put so much time into it, we wanted it to work. It felt really good on the [demonstration day] because it worked perfectly.” He adds, “It feels really good to understand your mistake and know how you can fix it. And once you do it and remember it the next time, that feels good.”

Creating a true desire to know. 

Mo doesn’t ascribe to spoon feeding students information, rather, she hopes to inspire a need to know, a desire to know. And rather than “teaching” her students, Mo explains that she’s creating opportunities for them to learn, and opportunities for them to take ownership of their learning.   

“We don’t just assign them a list of vocabulary and tell them you need to know force and energy, acceleration, and Newton’s three laws of motion. You’re not just delivering a curriculum, you’re creating a curriculum that inspires that ‘need to know.’” 

In her classroom, students often ask her, “Should I do this?” And Mo’s reply as often as not is, “I don’t know. Why don’t you try it and see what happens?” She laughs and explains, “Frankly, sometimes I know darn well that they’re going to fail.” But it’s part of the process. 

To learn more or schedule a tour, please visit www.marinhorizon.org.