Recently I read Open: how we’ll work, live and learn in the future by David Price, a worthwhile and recommended read. One quote stood out. One that is both worrying and a concern for many in the profession. David writes that “it is often said that a time-traveller from the 19ths century, beamed into today’s world, would be bewildered by everything he witnessed, but would instantly feel comfortable in a school.”

We have all heard much discussion about moving forward with education: blended learning, compacting curriculum, hackathons, flipped classroom, MOOCs. While the list goes on and there are many eager to explore these approaches, I believe that there are two things interfering with our progress: lack of trust and fear of failure.

Failure and making mistakes are great learning opportunities and should be viewed as the lifeblood to success. Experimentation is about moving into unknown territory and we must have the freedom to fail in order to innovate.

Perhaps we need to look not at having the freedom to fail, but view it as failing forward. If we fail forward, we learn, innovate and build resilience. Freedom comes through opportunities. Opportunities are our guides and failures are our teachers.

Henry Ford said that “failure is simply the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” It is agreed that we learn from mistakes and if we ask our students to be risk takers, then we must also be willing to take them. But why then aren’t we willing to try? Do we not take risks because we fear what others will think? Are we not capable, smart enough or experienced enough to succeed? Or is it because we feel there is no trusted support around us to help when we do make mistakes?

Michael Dell from Dell Inc stated that “to encourage people to innovate more, you have to make it safe for them to fail.”

Building mutual trust with those we work with is essential. Placing trust in others not only instils confidence but allows them to take ownership of the process. In turn, they should trust those who have given them the latitude to take risks. Trust is reciprocal. It is through this trust that we will be able to fail forward.

If our main concern is never to make a mistake, we will only ever meet the status quo. We won’t be looking for ways to make improvements or take any risks. Imagine an environment where innovation is not encouraged – All you will have is a hive full of worker bees, but no real visionaries to move forward. Is this perhaps why the time-traveller would feel at home in our classrooms?

Having the freedom to take chances and learn from our mistakes is essential. We have been doing it since childhood but somehow we have lost our courage to do it along the way. We must be able to make mistakes followed by the opportunities to grow from them and move forward in turn. It is not about rewarding the mistakes; the power lies in the trust to make them and learn.

Passion and purpose come from trust and enables us to embrace new thinking and learning. It is the courage we have in being vulnerable that supports the learning necessary for innovation, breakthroughs and success. Innovation and trust thrive in an environment where shame and blame have no stronghold. A culture that supports failing forward and encourages ownership of mistakes, reaps the benefits of better solutions and increases engagement.

Yet teaching remains one of the most private professions. We are living in a world that is highly social, linked and networked, yet we as teachers are fearful of sharing, being open to take risks and instead remain as we always have: retaining the status quo.

John Dewey said it best: “If we teach today’s students as we taught yesterday’s, we rob them of tomorrow.” We cannot continue to deprive our students. We have to work at changing the way we do things. We have to learn to trust and to have the courage to fail.

Trust doesn’t just happen, and we don’t intentionally work at building it. Perhaps this is where we start. If we want to inspire the youth of tomorrow, we must first start trusting each other, have the freedom to innovate and be willing to fail forward.

David Price claims that “hard fun is something that all learning professionals should strive to create.”  So, here’s to the hard fun ahead of us as we embrace change, begin to build trust and take greater risks to innovate.

After all, in the words of Soichiro Honda, “success is 99% failure. What we learn through failure becomes a precious part of us, strengthening us in everything we do. So, let the tough things make you tougher.”

Build Trust. Fail Forward.