Persevering

What is persevering?

Persevering is being determined, resilient, tenacious – never giving up. Albert Einstein said: “It’s not that I’m so smart, it’s just that I stay with problems longer.” Computer programming is hard. This is part of its appeal – writing elegant and effective code is an intellectual challenge requiring not only an understanding of the ideas of the algorithms being coded and of the programming language you’re working in, but also a willingness to persevere with something that’s often quite difficult and sometimes very frustrating.

A black and white photograph of Albert Einstein.

Albert Einstein: "It's not that I'm so smart, it's just that I stay with problems longer." Photograph by Oren Jack Turner.

To develop expertise in anything complex, we need to persevere and practise, train and rehearse. This applies to many fields of human endeavour: art, music, dance, sport, chess, research, computer gaming, programming … “The key is deliberative practice: not just doing it again and again but challenging yourself with a task that is just beyond your current ability, trying it, analysing your performance while and after doing it, and correcting any mistakes. Then repeat. And repeat again.” – Norvig, P. (2001): “Teach Yourself Programming in Ten Years”.

Why is persevering important?

In computing and elsewhere, systems and problems can be complex, their contexts unfamiliar. We may have to try many options or use technologies new to us; we may even need to change from our normal, fast and intuitive way of thinking to something slower, more deliberate and logical. Computer scientists need qualities of patience and endurance and a tolerance of confusion. In playing a challenging computer game, there’s a tight feedback loop of cause and effect which some liken to the process of coding and debugging: both gamers and programmers report a state of ‘flow’ in which they are utterly absorbed in their respective activities, a focus motivating them to persevere, finish the game or solve the problem.

What does persevering look like in the Primary curriculum?

Carol Dweck’s work on “growth mindsets” suggests that hard work and perseverance in the face of difficulties are key to educational outcomes. Her studies assert that pupils praised with “good job – you worked very hard” are more likely to develop a growth mindset than those praised with “good job – you’re clever.” Those who relish challenge can stay positive when things don’t work out as expected, seeing the opportunity to dig more, and those who keep going are likely to learn more, remaining confident that they’ll get through the confusion. They assimilate their new experiences, taking them as normal in the learning and improving of skills and techniques. Some children are continually enthusiastic and energetic; others exhibit a quiet persistence. In programming, encourage pupils to look for strategies they can use when they do encounter difficulties, such as working out exactly what the problem is, using search engines to find a solution, or asking a friend.

A photo of hands playing a piano, following sheet music.

Learning to play the piano requires perseverance through quiet and dogged patience and persistence.

3 - 5 years

Encourage patience and persistence. Arrange quiet areas for puzzles, space for building models, activities that span days if not weeks (such as growing seeds), and storage for half-finished models or drawings to which children can return. Across the curriculum, we use opportunities to talk about not giving up, such as reading “Incy Wincy Spider”, “The Tortoise and the Hare”, “Rosie Revere Engineer” or “Horton Hatches the Egg”. Within the EYFS profile, several characteristics and descriptors relate to perseverance, such as enjoying a sense of achievement; playing and exploring; possessing have-a-go and can-do orientations; viewing failures as opportunities to learn. Praise pupils when they have a go and keep going.

5 - 7 years

Foster a have-a-go climate in class. When a pupil is stuck, encourage independence. Model a patient, logical approach to problem-solving. Demonstrate how to decompose problems into manageable parts and how to tackle each in turn. You could even create scenarios where pupils do not complete tasks at the end of a lesson, so that they become accustomed to returning to a problem later. Teach them the steps of
debugging and allow them lesson time to practise looking carefully and persevering. Have them collaborate with a programming partner. Provide support materials, help sheets and displays. Make it clear that this is a normal part of programming: finding bugs and working on them should be celebrated just as much as actually fixing them.

A photo of a young child considering a Bee-Bot on a floormat.

Give pupils time to think about a task or problem.

7 - 11 years

Across the curriculum, there are tasks that some children will think beyond them. Foster confidence and independence by encouraging pupils to work things out for themselves, to persevere through difficulties or uncertainties. Very difficult problems will require a slow, methodical approach: nurture tenacity by teaching how to decompose large problems into smaller parts, each of which can then be better tackled. As part of this, collaboration is valuable too, but not the copying of quick-fix answers! Provide self-help materials and time. Open-ended tasks with a range of possible outcomes help pupils deal with ambiguity. In computing, a goal to create a Viking quiz does not specify the audience, the questions, the programming language or what a ‘good’ quiz might look like.

Longer projects allow children time to develop previous ideas, showing the benefits of persistence. Code created before might be repurposed and further developed. Pupils need to work through the process of debugging systematically, using logical reasoning to consider what should happen, what does happen, where things go wrong and how they’re fixed. Children may need help to keep going through the progressive revision of their work. Experiencing a degree of confusion can increase a child’s resilience. Some may find programming projects especially challenging because there are no immediate answers, and bugs may feel like failure. Support pupils to understand that debugging is to be expected and that there are often many possible solutions to a problem, some of which win out over others.

Find out more about persevering / Downloads

Dweck, C. (Robinson, 2012): “Mindset: how you can fulfil your potential”

Embracing confusion (opens in a new window)

Kahneman, D. (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011): “Thinking, fast and slow” (opens in a new window)

Simple English Wikipedia (opens in a new window)

Norvig, P. (2001): “Teach yourself programming in ten years” (opens in a new window)

Activities that are great to get you started:

These activities develop pupils' understanding of persevering.

Pizza Pickle Scratch Debugging

Age:7 - 9 years (although this can be adapted for other years)
Concepts / Approaches: Abstraction, Programming, Persevering, Logic, Debugging
Curriculum Links: D&T

Pupils are given programs that do not do as expected and are asked to fix them. Pupils use logical reasoning to predict what will happen, and develop their debugging skills.

The Pizza Pickle Scratch Debugging has been rated 5 stars

Logical Number Sequences

Age:9-10 years (although can be adapted for other ages)
Concepts / Approaches: Persevering, Collaborating, Logic, Patterns, Algorithms
Curriculum Links: Maths

Pupils explain the rule for a number sequence and predict which numbers come next, extending their knowledge of simple rule-based algorithms and using logical reasoning.

The Logical Number Sequences has been rated 5 stars

Animated Poem Decomposition

Age:7-11 years
Concepts / Approaches: Programming, Decomposition, Creating
Curriculum Links: English

Pupils create an animation of a poem using Scratch to learn about decomposition. Decomposition is breaking something down into smaller parts to help solve a problem or undertake a task.