As many of you know, I'm actively involved in the K-12 school I went to growing up, which

means I'm pretty tapped into what kids are doing in school these days.

And you know what I learned recently?

Some elementary schools intentionally don't have a racer's on pencils.

I was shocked to hear this until I learned about the rationale.

They want to teach kids that it's okay to make mistakes.

Crossing something out isn't ugly or wrong.

It's perfectly fine to revise, change your mind, make an error, write something incorrectly.

Mistakes are acceptable.

And if we force ourselves not to do things the right way, that may help us be creative

in ways we could never imagine.

For instance, my niece drew a picture of me with googly eyes.

Mistakes are everywhere, aunties spelled O-N-T-E things crossed out, yet it remains one

of the most beautiful pieces of artwork I've received.

There's even a triangle with some odd lines in it.

But instead of erasing what she had done, that triangle now looks like a 3-D pyramid.

It's taken on a whole new shape and maybe it's strange lines helped her expand her mind

to think about triangles in a whole new way.

This drawing makes it clear to me that removing the ability to erase can create the conditions

for students to be even more innovative in their work.

And taking erasers off pencils, letting kids make mistakes is just one way of rejecting

the norm.

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