Growth Mindsets for all: persisting in the face of

challenge

Welcome

• Who am I?• I’m not….• But I am…• I hope…..

Persisting in the face of challenge

Consider these characters who have persisted in the face of challenge:

• David (of David and Goliath) • JK Rowling• Ellie Simmonds (Paralympic swimmer)• Sam and Frodo (from Lord of the Rings)• Boxer Muhammad Ali/Cassius Clay• Your own experience

Identify:• What spurred you/them on to rise to the challenge?• What made you/them believe they could succeed?• What might have prevented you/them from persisting?

To get us started...

Evidence from Carol Dweck: How do mindsets affect learning?

What is a mindset?Mindsets are the collective term used by the researcher Carol Dweck to describe the different ways in which people, of all ages, view their personal ability, talent and intelligence.

Influences on academic progress?

In pairs discuss:• What you think determines your child’s

success at school?• What holds your child’s back?• What / who can support them?Hopefully by the end of this presentation you might have some new ideas and strategies.

What are the different ways pupils view their own learning?

Dweck‘s research identifies two distinct types of mindsetthat pupils form about themselves and their intelligence and cognitive abilities:

• the fixed mindset - pupils believe that they have a pre-determined amount of intelligence and capacity for cognitive achievement which can’t be altered.

• the growth mindset, in which pupils believe that their abilities and capacity can be developed by dedication and persistence and so are optimistic and resilient.

• Mindset and happiness: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGvR_0mNpWM

Questions about intelligence

Read each statement and decide if you mostly agree or disagree with it. A/D1. Your intelligence is something very basic about

you that you can’t change very much2. You can learn new things, but you can’t really

change how intelligent you are3. No matter how much intelligence you have,

you can always change it quite a bit4. You can always substantially change how

intelligent you are

Personality & character

Look at the statements below and decide whether you mostly agree or disagree with each one. A/D1. You are a certain kind of person and there is not much

that can be done to really change that2. No matter what kind of person you are, you can always

change substantially3. You can do things differently, but the important parts of

who you are can’t really be changed4. You can always change the basic things about the kind

of person you are

So what?

• How can this help us as parents?

Mindset Trait 1: How you want to appear to others?

Fixed Mindset: LOOK CLEVER AT ALL COSTS

Growth Mindset: LEARN AT ALL COSTS

Impacts of social media / TV?

Mindset Trait 1: How you want to appear to others

FIXED MINDSET:• Respond poorly

to feedback from others

• Jealous of the success of others

• Seek to put people down

GROWTH MINDSET:• Learn from

criticism and suggestions

• Seek strategies to improve

Questions

• Do we recognisedany of the fixed mindset traits in our child(ren)?

• What strategies do we use to support our children to embrace criticism

• As parents have we been provided with strategies to help our children improve. Work harder is not a strategy, neither is hope!

Mindset Trait 2 : Responding to setbacks

Fixed Mindset: It’s about meHIDE MISTAKES & DEFICIENCIES

BSE / BMW (SUMO)

Growth Mindset: It’s about learning CONFRONT MISTAKES & DEFICIENCIES

Do we recognise any of these? Dads and DIY / map reading?

Mindset Trait 2 : Responding to setbacks

FIXED MINDSET:• Avoids trying

something new• Finds it extremely

hard to cope with setbacks

• Seeks to blame others for their setbacks

GROWTH MINDSET:• Setbacks highlight

issues/problems that need to be dealt with and learnt from

• Actively seek out learning opportunities

Mindset Trait 3: Talent vs Effort

Fixed Mindset: IT SHOULD COME NATURALLY

Growth Mindset: WORK HARD, EFFORT IS KEY

Mindset Trait 3: Talent vs EffortFIXED

MINDSET:• Intelligent people are

born that way• See further effort as

undermining their genius

• Talent and intelligence is everything

GROWTH MINDSET:• Understands that no

matter what your natural aptitude, effort is essential to improve and achieve

• Persistently committed and motivated

Potential

Potential - Someone’s capacity to develop their skills with effort over time.

Benjamin Barber, eminent sociologist:“I don’t divide the world into the weak and the strong, or the successes and the failures …… I divide the world into the learners and nonlearners.”

Failure

• As a New York Times article points out, failure has been transformed from an action (I failed) to an identity (I am a failure).

• This is especially true in the fixed mindset.• Failure is not see as positive whilst is

should be seen as a learning opportunity.

Fixed mindset

• Risk and effort are two things that might reveal your inadequacies and show that you were not up to the task.

• In fact, it’s startling to see the degree to which pupils with a fixed mindset do not believe in effort.

Mistakes & Mindset• A crucial aspect of having a growth mindset is not being afraid to

make mistakes.• Mistakes are a fact of life and if we gave up after every one, we’d

never get anywhere.• Mistakes are part of the learning process and help us to perform

better next time.• Examples:

o Taking a wrong turno Learning a new languageo Learning to driveo Handwriting/spellingo Nike Mistakes Video

“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work and learning from failure” – Colin Powell (US Secretary of State 2001-2005)

The three great essentials to achieve anything worthwhile are: Hard work, Stick-to-itiveness, and Common sense” – Thomas A. Edison (Inventor)

“Nothing can substitute for just plain hard work. I had to put in the time to get back. And it was a grind. It meant training and sweating everyday. But I was completely committed to working out to prove to myself that I still could do it” – Andre Agassi (Tennis Player)

When I was young, I observed that nine out of ten things I did were failures. So I did ten times more work” – George Bernard Shaw (Playwright)

Resilience + Hard work + Belief that intelligence can grow =

a growth mindsetHow do we model this as parents?What do our children see / hear?

Why do mindsets matter?

• Consider Rowan and Naz, two classmates of similar achievement levels, and socio-economic background. They have been given the same task. It’s well-pitched, high-challenge, designed to stretch them.

• Rowan sets to with gusto. He’s good at this sort of task and values his reputation as someone who gets things right, fast. He finds the task unusually tough and quickly becomes dispirited, worrying that he’s coming across as ‘slow’. He tells his classmates the task’s ‘boring’ and he disengages from it.

• Naz sets to with gusto. He finds the task tough and his intellectual arousal is heightened. His initial attempts lead nowhere and he laughs when he realises he’s going down a blind alley. He tries a new strategy and engages classmates in a task-focused discussion. He shows curiosity and tenacity and steadily makes progress.

• From a comparable baseline, Naz’s growth mindset will trump Rowan’s fixed mindset, and these effects will become increasingly marked over time.

• Mindsets matter.

Intelligence is fixed (eg Rowan)

Intelligence is growable (eg Naz)

Priority Seeks out … Avoids ...

When things get tough…

Prove my learning (show I’m bright) Quick wins, easy successes, less able competitors, as these all show that I’m intellectually well-endowed. Tough challenges, effort, difficulty, higher-performing peers. I become flaky, flustered and flounder, or simply walk away from the task, doubting my capacity to accomplish it. Or maybe I’ll cheat.

Improve my learning (become brighter).

Challenges, smart friends and other opportunities to learn and improve, as these all assist my development. Tasks and situations that I’ve already mastered – no new learning there then. I try harder or revise my strategy. Ishow resilience, creativity and grit – and thereby become a better learner.

Where do Rowan’s and Naz’s different mindsets come from? Three candidates:

Fixed mindset Growth mindset

1. Praise and other rewards

Rowan has always been praised for getting things right, and quickly – ‘Clever boy!’ He now does things in measured proportion to the praise he receives.

Naz hasn’t had much praise from his parents, but they do notice and comment on his hard work and show interest in his activities – ‘So why did you choose this colour?’ They give helpful feedback.

Fixed mindset Growth mindset

2. Over-valuing ‘self-esteem’

Rowan’s parents are effusive about his every action. Why not? To be critical (or even neutral) would crush his fragile ‘self-esteem’

Naz’s parents don’t see it as their job to donate self-esteem. Instead they help him to see problems as intrinsically interesting, and to value effort not easy success.

Fixed mindset Growth mindset

3. The ‘hidden curriculum’

Rowan notices how interested his parents are in his performance relative to his peers’. Labels like ‘clever’, ‘stupid’, ‘quick’, ‘slow’ are used to describe people.

Naz notices how his parents value the effort and dedication that go into people’s achievements, and how seldom people are described in terms of their ‘natural abilities’.

Challenge and mindset

• But how does the concept of challenge relate to children’s mindset specifically?

• We’ve already seen from Rowan’s aversion to a high-challenge task and Naz’s embrace of it, that challenges are viewed differently by different people.

• For those with fixed mindsets, challenges carry with them the prospect of ‘failure’ and the consequent ‘exposure’ of a limited intelligence.

• • For those with a growth mindset, challenges are ideal learning

opportunities – a chance to extend their knowledge and skills beyond their current levels.

• • When children learn that sticking at tough, challenging tasks

leads to changes to their brains that make them smarter, we have a way of disrupting fixed mindsets and reinforcing growth mindsets.

Unpacking the evidence In pairs identify where at home:

• a growth mindset is helping to fuel success• a fixed mindset might be inhibiting success

What can we do as parents?

Dweck’s work identifies some key strategies that parents and teachers can use to promote growth mindsets:

1. Modelling a growth mindset themselves2. Modelling and encouraging positive self talk3. Explicitly encouraging and developing resilient attitudes

amongst our children4. Using praise to separate task performance from self worth 5. Developing childrens’ skills in their conscious use of problem

solving strategies to increase confidence and persistence

Positive Self Talk

Parent message

• You have permanent traits and I’m judging them - fixed

OR• You are a developing person and I’m

interested in your development - growth

Parent - messages about success

• You learned that so quickly! You’re so clever!

• Look at that drawing. Martha, is he the next Picasso or what?

• You’re so brilliant, you got an A without even studying!

These are familiar supportive, esteem-boosting messages

Feedback

• Do these sound familiar?• Have you used them?• Are they fixed or growth mindset?

What might a child hear?

• If I don’t learn something quickly, I’m not clever

• I shouldn’t try drawing anything hard or they’ll see I’m no Picasso

• I’d better quit studying or they won’t think I’m brilliant

Dweck’s Research• Praising children’s intelligence harms their

motivation and it harms their performance• Children love to be praised for their

intelligence and talent. It gives them a boost but only for the moment.

• When they hit a snag, their confidence goes and the motivation falls. If success means they’re clever, then failure means they’re stupid = a fixed mindset

Dweck’s advice to parents

• Teach their children to love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning.

• Children then don’t have to be slaves of praise

• They will have a life-long way to build and repair their own confidence

Over to you

• My son of eight is doing badly at school. I know he’s clever, but he just can’t be bothered. He’s so lazy….. His teachers are getting fed up too… He can do the work, it’s just that he won’t. is there anything we can do? – written to a national newspaper

Can you suggest problems with this part of the response?

• Tell your son that he’s clever…..look at his homework with him and praise him to the skies when he gets the right answers. Take his side against the ‘idiot teachers’ who are scolding him…..Find out if it might not be a good idea if he’s m oved from his class – either up or down…..Sometimes, particularly with people who are basically bright, confidence can make them brighter.

• How would you respond?

Mindset response• Leave off this ‘clever’ stuff! Whatever you do,

don’t say things like, ‘You should find it easy – you’re a bright boy!’ Look at his homework with him, and show interest in it. Express delight when you find things puzzling and challenge: ‘Wow – this is tough – we should learn something useful here!’ When the task is easy, express mild disappointment and find ways to make things more interesting.

• Talk to his teachers and see if they can personalise the work sometimes. If he can do the work already, could they relate the homework to a real-life project or problem, and/or get him to do it jointly with a good friend? Go easy on the praise, stickers and rewards, but don’t stint on the feedback or interest in his activity. Look to change of class or school only as a last resort.

Unpacking the evidence

• You are in a growth mindset home; what does it

look like... feel like… sound like…?

No Praise?

• Not at all. But avoid praise that judges their intelligence or talent. Or praise that implies that we are proud of them for their intelligence or talent rather than for the work they put in.

• Praise for the growth-orientated process – what they accomplish through practice, study, persistence and good strategies.

What is the message?

• Wow you did that so quickly!• Look, you didn’t make any mistakes

Question

• What might our children be hearing from this?

• We are telling them that what we prize are speed and perfectionism.

• Child’s response?• If you think I’m smart when I’m fast and

perfect, I’d better not take on anything challenging

Question

• What could we say?

What should we say?

• Whoops, I guess that was too easy• Let’s do something you can really learn

from!• Help them learn ways of doing things

better next time• Develop new or better skills• Encouraging think and learning• Foster their interests, growth and learning

• Praise should deal not with personality attributes but with efforts and achievements

• We can praise them as we want for the growth-orientated process – what they accomplish through practice, study, persistence and good strategies

• Ask them about their work in a way that admires and appreciates their efforts and choices

A Task For You

• Reflect on a personal goal or ambition you’ve achieved in your lives to date, and capture the ‘how’ of your achievement in a single word or phrase.

And the research results..

Effort Coping with obstacles Thinking about times I’ve achieved difficult things before

Proving others wrong

Support from others Practice Advice Constructive feedback

Perseverance Planning Bounce-back-ability Modifying my goals

Determination Persistence Interest in it Breaking it down into small steps

Risk-taking Making a strategy Imagining myself doing it

Having a vision

Having a go Encouragement Working to repay others’ faith in me

Sacrifice

Enjoying the process Self-belief Self-discipline

patience Positive self-talk

Trying a different approach

Show your child this

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H14bBuluwB8