Fear of failure and not having the “right” answer is one of the most common challenges STEM students face. This anxiety is especially prevalent when your class gives them their first real STEM experience.
While most traditional courses condition students to expect clear “right” answers – where consistent effort typically leads to good grades – STEM operates differently, challenging this familiar paradigm.
Why Failure is Essential in STEM
Here’s the crucial truth: failure is not just common in STEM – it’s a fundamental part of the learning process. The foundation of STEM education rests on the engineering design process.
While various versions exist, all authentic engineering processes share two key characteristics: they’re iterative and focused on developing, testing, and improving solutions to real-world problems.
In STEM, perfection on the first attempt isn’t just unlikely – it’s not even the goal. Students may never achieve a “perfect” solution, and that’s completely okay. The real learning happens through the process of developing solutions, testing them, failing, and making improvements.
This concept often challenges students’ traditional understanding of academic success until they experience it firsthand.
Grab this free STEM lesson to introduce your students to engineering and design thinking today!
Recognizing Fear of Failure in STEM
As educators, we’ve all witnessed how fear of failure in STEM manifests in our classrooms.
I’ve seen students completely shut down and refuse to continue working because they couldn’t immediately determine the “right” answer. Others become visibly frustrated or angry when their initial ideas don’t work as planned.
If you’re teaching STEM, you’ve likely encountered similar situations – and if you’re new to STEM teaching, prepare to face these challenges head-on!
Strategies to Address Fear of Failure in STEM
So… how do we help our students overcome this common challenge and embrace the iterative nature of STEM thinking? Here are some proven strategies that have worked in my classroom:
Emphasize the process over the product
STEM is about problem solving, and we should focus on helping students become better problem solvers. This means explicitly teaching students strategies for solving problems, assessing students’ problem-solving skills, and giving specific feedback on their attempts at problem-solving.
An engineering design process rubric can help you and your students focus on the problem-solving process.
Practice with smaller low-stakes challenges
Jumping into a big weeks-long STEM project right off the bat is intimidating. Instead try to plan a few small, simple STEM challenges at the beginning of your course (Get started with this free “What is engineering?” lesson plan and STEM challenge!).
It doesn’t feel as stressful when a prototype you’ve only been working on for 10 minutes fails. This will also give you an opportunity to see which of your students may struggle with fear of failure and allow you to do some coaching around perseverance.
This leads me to tip #3.
Talk about perseverance
As a class, discuss what perseverance looks like and what it feels like. Call it out when you see students persevering in the classroom. Give students opportunities to shout one another out for persevering.
Even students who take to STEM naturally will encounter a project that is challenging. It’s important to have everyone buy into the culture of perseverance.
Model overcoming failure
As STEM teachers, we are often learning new technologies as we use them with our students. You will make mistakes, and that is OK. Use it as a teaching opportunity and show students how you go about solving the problem.
As they say “actions speak louder than words.”
Don’t give answers but scaffold as needed
When students are really struggling, it’s easy to feel like you should just give them an answer. However, when we do this, our students miss out on this opportunity to practice perseverance and create their own solution.
Instead, when students really need a push, you can guide them to identify points of failure and help them identify ways to improve their prototype by asking questions. “What happened when you did X? Why do you think Y happened? What does the project criteria say about Z?”
In this way, you can guide their thinking and help them move forward in the process, but your students will still have ownership over their final design.
Building Resilience Through STEM
One of the most challenging yet rewarding aspects of being a STEM teacher is the opportunity to cultivate crucial life skills in your students.
By implementing these strategies with intentional planning and providing plenty of practice opportunities, you’ll help students overcome their fear of failure in STEM.
Soon, you’ll watch them tackle bigger challenges with confidence and creativity, equipped with problem-solving skills that extend far beyond the classroom.
Looking for more support in teaching STEM?
Grab this FREE “What is engineering?” lesson and materials to introduce your students to engineering and STEM.
In this lesson, students will share their background knowledge about engineering. Then, they engage in a hands-on engineering experience as they design, build, and test cell phone stands.
Afterward, students reflect on their experience, identify misconceptions about engineering, and construct a deeper understanding of what engineers do.
Next, students research the definition of engineering and discover a variety of engineering careers.
Finally, students reflect on their learning and revise their definitions of engineering from the beginning of class.
Grab this lesson and STEM challenge today and begin helping your students confront their fear of failure in STEM today!
