Does your classroom foster a growth mindset?
The role of praise:
“Parents think they can hand children permanent confidence—like a gift—by praising their brains and talent. It doesn’t work, and in fact has the opposite effect. It makes children doubt themselves as soon as anything is hard or anything goes wrong. If parents want to give their children a gift, the best thing they can do is to teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning. That way, their children don’t have to be slaves of praise. They will have a lifelong way to build and repair their own confidence.”
― Carol S. Dweck, Mindset: How You Can Fulfil Your Potential
The role of teachers:
“Like my sixth-grade teacher, Mrs. Wilson, these teachers preached and practiced the fixed mindset. In their classrooms, the students who started the year in the high-ability group ended the year there, and those who started the year in the low-ability group ended the year there. But some teachers preached and practiced a growth mindset. They focused on the idea that all children could develop their skills, and in their classrooms a weird thing happened. It didn’t matter whether students started the year in the high- or the low-ability group. Both groups ended the year way up high. It’s a powerful experience to see these findings.”
― Carol S. Dweck, Mindset: How You Can Fulfil Your Potential
Watch this video which provides a great overview of Dweck’s growth mindset philosophy.
Strategies for Fostering a Growth Mindset in Your Classroom:
3. Check Yourself. What is Your Own Mindset? What is Your Own Internal Voice Telling You?
4. Give Your Students on the Right Kind of Praise. Praise Effort Not Intelligence.
5. Read more to learn all about Growth Mindset:
Be the Change 