Study Skills: How to Handle Perfectionism (10-13)

Perfectionism is a heavy weight. It seems like it helps you do better in school, but it actually makes school harder. It sucks the joy out of learning and causes a huge amount of stress. It makes you get in your own way. But the tricky issue is, getting things perfect and achieving as much as you can honestly feel like the right things to do. Sometimes it even feels like it would be morally wrong to give yourself a break.

But try, for example, sitting down with a blank doc and writing a perfect first draft. Although it may feel like it's essential, it's absolutely impossible - even for professional, published authors. If you try, you will not achieve your goal; you will only achieve acute frustration and possibly even despair. So give yourself permission to write a messy first draft. Even better, learn to enjoy the journey from messy to great!

Ok, but how? Changing your mindset isn't easy, but sometimes it helps to just understand the true nature of perfectionism and overachieving, how they genuinely affect your heart, mind, and life, and what your priorities really are. This discussion-based class will help students explore their feelings and experiences with perfectionism and come away with a fresh perspective - and some practical tools for revamping their approach to learning. 

Most of it will be verbal discussion, but these things can be hard to talk about. So we will also use a private Padlet, a collaborative bulletin board where students can post some of their thoughts, feelings, and experiences anonymously and we can discuss them aloud, in case some students feel more comfortable that way. I also kept the max class size small so that it will feel like a more intimate conversation and not a public announcement. There is also a short handout that I want the students to read before class so we can discuss it.