Learning from your mistakes
Lots of students, when they make a mistake, apologize immediately. I have always wondered why and assumed that this is not at all necessary. Making mistakes, like having a temperature or a pain, is a signal. It warns us that something has not been fully assimilated or that our concentration is not one hundred percent. Both situations can be cured: by the teacher in the first instance and by the student in the second .If a student didn’t make mistakes, a teacher would not be necessary. However, if of course, the same mistake is made repeatedly, the alarm signs come on and the teacher or student must treat the weakness with adequate attention in order to eliminate it.
Some of the most common mistakes are:
*Not participating actively in class.
*Not asking the teacher about your doubts in class; you do not need to be a heroe and understand everything.
*Not revising what you have done in class, preferably on the same day, so that you can clear up any insecurity in the next class: Otherwise your progress will be limited.
*Not doing methodical exercises to eliminate recurrent errors or to firmly grasp acquired structures as they maybe in danger of disappearing rapidly from the nearest teacher of your mind.
But not all your mistakes or insecurities may be due to negligence on your part. Certain native teachers have only learned English as just that… a native. But they may not be fully conversant with the rules that a foreign speaker needs to have clarified to distinguish basic differences between this language and their own in order to avoid traps and pitfalls.
They speak and write the language well and can help you learn it. Many of us teachers on the way to having expertise have had to consult innumerable sources to find the best (and, the simplest!) way to make difficult structures easy for you and make them stick in your mind.
Teaching and learning is a two way process and a sharing. Your doubting and questioning will help to alert your teacher and make him/her a better professional and you a more efficient learner. Don’t be a passive member of class and stop whipping yourself if you have genuinely tried hard.
Take steps to achieve clear knowledge each step of the way and… If at first you don´t succeed, try, try and try again.
Sounds familiar? That is the philosophy we have to apply to everything in life!