Teaching Tip: Gaining Attention via Deliberate Mistakes

I was in senior school, and like many senior schoolers, I spent large amounts of my time in the classroom daydreaming. That was until my math teacher started making regular math mistakes on the whiteboard. When the mistakes first started, you could see groups of teenagers begin to whisper to each other. You could hear comments such as, “does this guy even know how to do the math?” One thing is for sure, the mistakes got our attention! This begs the question, did this guy know how to do the math he was meant to be teaching, or was this guy a seniors-teaching genius in gaining attention via deliberate mistakes?

It turns out he was a genius! Sure, we figured out what he was doing, but that didn’t matter, and there was always someone who would call out the correct answer.

Never have I seen a teacher with as much sustained attention throughout every lesson of the semester.

Fast forward a few years, and I find myself being a teacher. And like my old teachers and current teaching peers, I find myself teaching to a brick wall at times. Obtaining and maintaining full student attention can be difficult for nearly all teachers worldwide, past and present. However, what makes a passionate and skilled teacher, is a teacher that learns and tries new methods for student attention.

When I teach and see students whispering to each other, eyes staring into the abyss, or see students fiddling, I know that I haven’t got their full attention. Before I blame the students, I reflect on my teaching and ask how I can get their attention?

One method: Make deliberate mistakes!

The method of gaining attention via deliberate mistakes works extremely well. Using this method in my classroom added energy to the class. Although my 9-11 year-olds weren’t senior students like I was when my teacher used this method, the attention I obtained from them was the same. Perhaps even better than when I was a senior.

I would make math mistakes, spelling mistakes, mistakes in the information I give for projects, mistakes in whatever the students were learning. The students loved it! They loved seeing me, the all-knowledgeable teacher, make mistakes. The students eventually realised that I was doing it deliberately, but nothing changed; they still maintained their attention to my teaching. Making deliberate mistakes as a teacher also becomes an excellent excuse when you make a genuine mistake.

I would recommend that you don’t overdo ‘deliberate mistakes.’ Like all teaching methods, it can expire if used too frequently. Use your professional judgement on this one!