Failure: A Gift to the Gifted

The power of a first-person narrative is phenomenal. It is motivating, engaging, and fun. Moreover, it can be an asset to gifted students if we give those students the gift of failure.

This is an excerpt from the article "Live Action Role-Playing (Larp): Insight into an Underutilized Educational Tool" by Aaron Vanek and Andrew Peterson (Schrier, Learning, Education & Games, Volume Two, ETC Press, 2016):

The problem is not that games cannot teach. The problem is that not enough games, nor different types of games have been used, studied, or compared for their educational capability... [Live-action roleplaying games] can be an amazing catalyst for classroom engagement, improved student focus, drive, motivation, and even understanding across a wide range of subjects. Additionally, larps exercise the soft skills of time management, critical thinking, teamwork, empathy, and (one of the most important) accepting and learning from failure [Emphasis mine].

Absolutely.

If our society values a lifelong love of learning, as well as fostering citizens to be thoughtful, ethical, and bold, then we should support educational methods that develop these virtues. Currently, the widespread belief is that live-action roleplaying is a fringe pastime, if it is even thought about at all. Certainly it is fun and compelling to those brave or geeky enough to participate, but it has the potential to be a powerful tool for education.

Is modern education lacking?

To answer this, we look at how our "best and brightest" are faring when they get into the "real world." It seems commonplace now to hear mothers lament of their children, "they have so much potential, but..." The failure of education is the lack of failure in education. Because of this, gifted students fail at failure. The gift to the gifted is to learn failure.

I was a gifted student, able to easily remember information, understand concepts, and apply these to diverse problems (quizzes and tests). With very little effort, I achieved received top grades even into college. I didn't really know what failure was like until my lack of ambition drove me to withdraw from college. I could have quickly recovered from this setback and persevered. Instead, it took me many years to recognize what was needed to succeed in the "real world."

There are many kinds of failure. I love the expression "you pass failure on the way to success" because every failure is a learning opportunity. Some failures, however, are more costly than others, and when I withdrew from college, it was catastrophically life-changing. Formerly, my peers had struggled with information and concepts that I mastered easily, yet now I saw these same peers become successful in their burgeoning careers while I sifted through craigslist with an "unskilled" resume. Don't get me wrong, I was happy for their success and never resented them for it. Yet the words of my mother haunted me: "You have so much potential if you'd only work at it." I eventually graduated and I love where I am in life now, but I want to make sure that my children are given the opportunity to know how to confront failure.

Was my failure a result of modern education? No, but it did me no favors.

More and more, our developed, digitized, 21st century society has come to realize that the way children have been taught for the past two hundred years is lacking. Of course there are plenty of benefits to the structure of a classroom, lecture, and private study. These benefits, however, extend only to certain types of learning and education. I believe what is lost is the inner motivation to personal success; to realize one's potential. Sports, band performances, and competitions are excellent tools that reinforce this "struggling through failure on the way to success" principle. I believe that larping provides yet another tool, and its scope is perhaps greater in terms of personal development.

Because they are fictitious first-person narratives, larps provide unique opportunities to challenge any participant in areas that they have yet to develop. By incorporating experiential education methods into larps, the students learn from their mistakes in a quick, powerful, and safe way. I call this "quest education." Because the scenarios are fictitious, the learning contexts can be as extraordinary as can be imagined, from natural disaster recovery or political collapse to resisting tyranny or negotiating between two well-meaning but harmful groups. If only our gifted students could be confronted with situations that they are not well prepared to handle, and let them see the consequences of their mistakes in a way that is powerful yet safe. Larps can do this, and even allow for these learning opportunities at a frequency that dwarfs other experiential education methods.

Ultimately, everyone's failure is their own. Yet it is the duty of parents, teachers, and leaders to equip children with the foundations to be able to realize their potential in a happy and robust way,despite setbacks and past failures. So, the next time you see kids playing cops and robbers, perhaps ask if you could lead them in a quest and allow them to make decisions - to make mistakes or bad choices - with reasonable consequences within the story. Be their mentor as the kids struggle with why they were captured or imprisoned. They'll be better for it.