ABSTRACT
Recent literature in the instructional design field has noted that the field usually focuses heavily on leading learners toward success. However, learners’ failure experiences can be just as beneficial if not more beneficial than the traditional methods. Other literature suggests that repeated instances of failure can lead to issues of self-efficacy and negatively impact engagement. The purpose of this chapter is to provide instructional design and educational technology students with a broad, yet practical, overview of failure-based instructional strategies, more broadly referred to as learning from failure. We want to make an important distinction here at the onset of this chapter. In many instances, failure is considered a natural part of the learning process (i.e., at some point, a group of learners can be unsuccessful or encounter great struggle). We do not dispute this point! The purpose of this chapter is to instead focus on instructional strategies and approaches that presume failure will occur and discuss how to utilize that failure to lead to more meaningful learning.
