“The Unexpected Benefits of Being Wrong” is the subtitle of this book and a pretty good summary of it too. We tend to feel bad about making mistakes, but Better by Mistake helps remind us that mistakes are one of the most important learning tools we have.
Two of this book’s ideas resonated with me. The first is that effort is more important than results. I think this is particularly true for people as they are growing up — you learn more from trying and failing than you do from effortlessly succeeding. I have found that children (mine and others’) respond more positively when praised for effort rather than achievement — they keep on trying, rather than just basking in the warm pleasant glow of approval.
I picked up a great book in the library the other day. A Kick in the Head – An Everyday Guide to Poetic Forms is a children’s book describing and illustrating about 30 poetic forms. It includes obvious ones like the limerick, haiku, sonnet and couplet, but there were several that I hadn’t encountered before. I especially appreciate the forms with very rigid constraints, such as the villanelle, the triolet and the very tricky pantoum.
This is a collection of short stories; but mostly they are so short I would call them sketches rather than stories. Some are only a paragraph or two. Quite dense and evocative. Some are quite affecting, such as the title story.
This is a hilarious and intriguing book, painstakingly written by assembling thousands of fragments from several decades’ worth of women’s magazines. The tone of the sentences is unmistakable.
