We all have our comfort zones, and there are specific things that take us outside of them. When we step outside of our comfort zones, we experience an abundance of feelings that we mostly don’t like. As adults, we know that to have gained a profession or career, we had to go outside of our comfort zones, e.g., sitting for exams, listening to a lecture on statistics, or doing an oral presentation for our professor. We believe that one of a child’s first experiences outside of their comfort zone is probably starting preschool. There is a new environment, new adults caring for them, a new routine, new boundaries, and much more. These are some of the feelings that this can evoke, such as fear, uncertainty, sadness, discomfort, and confusion. For us as adults to take ourselves outside our comfort zones, we need to muster the courage, the ability to take risks, and also find some trust in our ability in that situation.
Learning can be intimidating, especially when we are being pushed beyond something we have never done before. Many children aren’t averse to trying new things if they are offered to them in the right way. “If we want children to accomplish new challenges, they must be scaffolded with lower-stakes trials first.* Ensuring a child’s success is our top priority. Once a child knows what it feels like to succeed, this can be a strong motivating factor in itself when we introduce them to something new.
* Taken from an article written about children and their comfort zones.
