Simply showing up is not enough

May 7, 2018 | 6:31 AM

KAMLOOPS — Over the weekend, our youngest had a karate testing for green belt. He became appropriately nervous as the day drew nearer, but also told me that he is looking at it as if it is another class in which he has to deliver his best; much like he is expected to do in every class. It’s hard work but there’s a progression of skill learning that feeds into a healthy sense of motivation.

If you show up, do your best, otherwise there’s no point to it; their sensei emphasizes the concept every chance he gets. Do your best, no matter what, whether there’s someone assessing your performance or not. When the day comes to show your knowledge and skills, you’ll stand a good chance to achieve your best. Or, if you fail, know what you need to work at.

Then the big day came. Mostly kids but a couple of adults too were being tested on various level belts, from white to purple (which comes before the green.) I wish I could say everyone passed and all in attendance celebrated with smiles and applauses at the end, but that is not the case. Some of the kids did not.

To clarify, the testing is not a stiff process. There is guidance during the test, suggestions on how to best perform certain moves, and you are allowed a few tries. Still, not everyone passes. That is almost unheard of in today’s learning environment for children (teenagers too.) But not getting something such as a higher belt level in martial arts, or a qualification for a sport, or a good mark at school, that serves a purpose. A teacher’s purpose (by that I mean all adults involved with teaching children, as well as parents) is to guide through that. Showing up does not guarantee success. With hard work you stand a better chance.

Instead, many children learn the opposite, most of the time. They show up and good things come their way. Until they don’t, of course, as it happens once they turn into adults and the bubble wrap magically disappears, revealing a less indulgent reality.

While trying to protect children from tasting the bitterness of failure, we are in fact taking away from them the opportunity to learn how to better themselves and what it takes to do so. At the same time, we are still applying the pressure of ‘you better keep being amazing.’ This, while removing the tools they need to carve out that reality for themselves as they go through life.

A mom to adult children told me of a troubling redefinition of winning and losing teams in children sports she has witnessed in recent years. There is no losing team, she said. The word has been dropped. You simply did not win, they’ll say. Better luck next time. It takes away from everyone in the game, winners and losers alike. And yes, it is OK to lose. It is a game after all and neither outcome defines you as a winner or a loser. It speaks of the performance. Which can be enhanced if the motivation exists.

In learning, there is failure, there is making mistakes and there is disappointment. Guideposts of sorts with little or no room for instant gratification.

When my eldest was about to start kindergarten, both parents and kids got a tour of the school. The office was defined as the place where you go when you did something good, or ‘something not good,’ the teacher explained. No guideposts; and good luck with that.

That children and teenagers thrive when challenged is no mystery. They do. In the absence of being challenged by educators, parents, and other significant adults, they make up their own challenges. They do crazy stuff, they misbehave, pushing boundaries to where they see something happen. Permissiveness has its perils, and we see that a lot these days. Healthy boundaries are not there only to stop them but to give them guidance as to how far they can go and what they can push through while growing into reliable, resilient, and dependable young adults.

I have heard from many children that school is boring. Either the material is very easy (no challenge,) so they finish early and stare at the walls (read: invent trouble as they do so, expectedly,) or they find it unappealing. I have heard that from teachers too. They also wish they could make it more exciting, but they have to adhere to rules, regulations and curriculums. Fair enough. Still, children need to feel challenged. To feel challenged as you learn is to expand your understanding and grow your knowledge, more so of yourself, of your likes and dislikes. Something’s gotta give. We owe it to children to make learning of all kinds desirable and worth pursuing.

To feel challenged as you learn, whether at school, or while practising extracurricular activities, is to learn that showing up is not enough. When challenged, we strive to give it our best. Sometimes we succeed, other times not. That’s how we learn what motivation tastes like. Children need to be given many opportunities to know what that means.

They will grow into better people from there. And they will also acquire a sense of belonging as they do so. Well-roundedness, a much-pursued state of being, does not come just from learning various subjects, sports, and such; it comes from pursuing learning at all levels, and in all ways. Becoming a better version of yourself, each day. If a child is to have a proper inheritance, it should be the knowledge that he or she could do that.

Not just in personal or team pursuits, but social pursuits as well, I am willing to say. And we need that, more than ever. And soon.