I am well aware that the title of this post may seem a little odd. Stay with me.
If all goes according to plan, you will see a lot of information on my Grade 2 class blog this year about having a growth mindset. For a Grade 2 learner, having a growth mindset boils down to three key understandings, one of which is “Mistakes are Important”. I don’t often blog on weekends, but this has been on my mind. You see, I owe an explanation about something I shared earlier in the year.
Mistakes are Important
I made a mistake at the very end of the first post I wrote for my 2016-2017 class. I inserted a google doc about blogging. The document is not in English. It is in Albanian. This was an important mistake, so important that I didn’t translate it back. When I finish an English version of the letters that go home with most of Team 2, I use Google Translate to make a version for families that do not speak English. When I wrote that blog post, somehow I managed to insert the wrong version. This was an important mistake.
All of the Grade 2 families in my class have access to my blog. However, not all of these families speak or read English at home. Imagine what it would be like to try to figure out what the Team 2 blog was all about if everything you saw there was as confusing as my title today (and my Google Doc). I left this mistake because it was an eye-opener for me, and I thought it would be an eye-opener for some of my readers as well.
The other piece of this mistake that is important is that it made me aware of how uncomfortable my audience is with the mistakes of others. I have had a document on my blog published in another language for almost 3 weeks, and no one (besides my father – thanks for continuing to read everything I write Dad!) pointed it out or asked me if this was intentional. The counter I keep on my blog indicates that many people saw it. What made everyone hesitate to point out such an obvious anomaly?
I plan to blog in English for the rest of the year. If you notice another language periodically, do what the families who do not speak English have to do. Translate it. Hint: Click here
Becky Versteeg
Grade 2, Listowel Eastdale
Leigh Cassell Consulting 
I enjoyed reading your post Becky. Thank you for sharing this “aha”. Your post really made me think about the number of considerations we need to make for others, and not only for the students and families we support, but within our larger blogging communities as well. Creating opportunities for others that are inclusive and responsive to their needs, is really about our ability to communicate. Cross-cultural communication- and I would argue ALL communication- should begin with empathy. We need to first understand our audience, before we begin to ‘communicate’ with them.
And building an audience- your professional and/ or personal learning network (PLN)- is a VERY important ‘digital’ life skill that is dependent on your ability to communicate. What are some of the conversations you are having with students about communicating with others online?
Leigh Cassell
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Thank you Miss. Versteeg. It’s actually comforting to read that “Mistakes are important”. I teach English for middle school students and most often I tend to correct their mistakes while they’re communicating with me. It hit me hard one day when a kid opened up and said that he didn’t feel comfortable being corrected. He also said that he forgets about things that he was about to tell me.Now, I am making an effort not to correct and also to ignore few times the errors. Let me tell you, it’s not easy at all! But I’m glad I’m ridding of this habit, because “Mistakes are important”.
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