Mistakes can feel utterly humiliating, but the human brain puts them to good use, quickly identifying and reconciling contradictory information to build more accurate, durable solutions. “Every time a student makes a mistake … they grow a synapse,” explains Stanford psychology professor Carol Dweck.⁣ ⁣ Creating a mistake-friendly classroom encourages kids to develop a healthy mindset that accepts—and learns from—failure. Here are a few evidence-based strategies to try.⁣ ⁣ • Acknowledge that fear is real: For students with math anxiety, facing numbers activates the same fear circuitry that snakes or spiders do, prompting kids to shut down. Teach students to identify and replace destructive thoughts like “I’m stupid” with “I’m learning.” ⁣ ⁣ • Work in the zone of proximal development: Introduce problems that are challenging, open-ended, and allow students to draw on prior knowledge. As they figure out why certain answers are correct, but also how and why others are incorrect, they’ll dee...