I pulled her aside later and said, “I do art too. I know what you are talking about. As an artist, you have the image inside your head, and what comes out on the page isn’t what you imagined. It doesn’t live up to the picture in your head.”
“Exactly! Oh my gosh, you get it!”
“So I’m going to talk to you as an artist.”
She leaned forward, ready to trust me.
“No one else can see inside your head. They can’t compare the image you had in your imagination to the image you were able to draw. All they can see is the absolutely amazing piece of artwork that you produced.”
She made a face.
“Do you want to know what to say when people compliment your art?”
She nodded.
“Say thank you.”
The next day a student came to her and enthused about her drawing. She said, “But …” Then she looked at me, turned back to him, and said, “Thank you.”
All my students need to learn that lesson—to strive for excellence, not perfection.
I start my year telling students I know many of them are perfectionists. I will help them get over that in a simple way. They won’t be able to be perfect in my classroom. The standards will be too high for them to be perfect. They will have to settle for merely being excellent.
Perfectionism stresses students out. Ironically, being told not to be perfect stresses some students too! But in the long run, they learn to set reasonable expectations.
Not long ago one of my students wrote an essay where he quoted something I had said to him:
“It’s ok not to be perfect. It’s ok to get an 80 or a 90. When I was in college, I decided that there was one class where I would settle for a B because I wanted a life too. If I hadn’t settled for that one B, I would have been studying 100% of the time instead of having any time to go out and play.”
He said those were the words that changed his life. When he started to stress, he would repeat what I had said to him. That helped him calm down and believe in himself.
I talk to parents too. Telling kids to ease off the gas can sound counterintuitive to some parents, so I usually talk to them the same time I talk to the students. Besides, often my parents are perfectionists themselves, so it’s important to make sure the message is heard by the adults as well as the kids. Sometimes they need to celebrate spectacular failures with their children!
My goal is that my students do stellar work—far beyond anything they ever dreamed they could do. But that they also sleep at night.
And I want them to have time to do more than just school work. Including art, drama, music, sports, and all the rest.
Thank you, Jan. As usual your wisdom is so kind. I will be sharing your article with a number of beloved children and their parents.
I loved reading about those moments you had with your perfectionist students and their parents. We can all strive for excellence, but expecting perfection is absolutely crippling. In high school, when I got my first (of two total) Bs, I was devastated. And, I absolutely identify with your former student who reflected that a B was actually freeing, giving him more time to do things other than study.
It also enrages me that students feel that they are expected to know what they want to study and do after high school, presumably for the rest of their lives. No teenager (or tween, or kid!) deserves that kind of pressure. In my Homeroom this year, we had a few Character Strong lessons focusing on how students wanted to be, rather than what they want to do as they move through the world. That shift really resonated with my students and sparked some great conversations.