The (not-so) Secret Ingredient to Helping Students Learn: Growth Mindset

The (not-so) Secret Ingredient to Helping Students Learn: Growth Mindset

LESSON CREATED BY LAURA DIAZ USING VIDEO FROM CRAfT Educational Videos 

*Access the Lesson on TEDEd by clicking this link—>Helping Students Understand Growth Mindset

Challenges are what make life interesting. Overcoming them is what makes life meaningful. ~Joshua J. Marine

The terms “fixed mindset” and “growth mindset”, although new to me, were easily accepted; and upon reflection, I believe this is due to how they are easily observed within my own experiences. To have a “fixed mindset” refers to people who believe that intelligence is fixed.  Individuals who hold to this mindset are less effective learners than those with a “growth mindset” who believe that intelligence can be developed with experience and practice.

It is important for the reader to self-assess where they fall within the “fixed mindset”/growth mindset” spectrum.

The belief that your intelligence is unchangeable, to me, is absolutely false. In fact, it wasn’t until the moment I read that statement that I realized just how passionate is my belief concerning that statement.

In the same vein, I agreed completely with the statement that you can always change your intelligence.  No matter how “good” you are at something there is always room for growth. No matter how “miserable” you are at something there is always the possibility of growth.

For me, it has always bottom-lined at “want to.”  I do not “want to” get better at skiing.  Therefore, it is not going to happen.  Trust me, it’s not.  🙂 That is unless I am faced with some life-threatening event in which it becomes necessary. Then, you can bet your bottom dollar that I will figure out a way to make it happen.  It may take a lot of blood, sweat, and tears on my part, but I’ll make it happen.

On the other hand, from a different perspective, I can clearly see how my “growth mindset” can differ from one arena of life to the next.  Thankfully, for the most part, I tend to be full feet in the “growth mindset.”

 However, I must confess that it has not always been that way for me.  As a child, I was trained into the “fixed mindset” mentality and as an adult, it took quite a bit for me to get to the mindset I have today. Once I began to believe that I can grow and excel, in spite of the nay-sayers, the result was that I began to see other people in that light also.  Those that others may write-off I never will. That is because of the many teachers and adults in my own childhood that attempted to write me off.

Taking this into account, I created a lesson plan complete with end of video quiz, discussion questions, and further links to “DIG DEEPER” into the topic to learn more.   Watch the video below and then follow  THIS LINK that takes you to the TED-Ed site so that you can explore the lesson.  Leave me a comment and tell me your take on the whole “fixed mindset” and “growth mindset” issue.

 

Happy Teaching!