Dive Brief:
- Developing a growth mindset in students has become a popular social-emotional learning goal in schools, and a District Administration report finds that it gains the strongest foothold when it has been adopted by administrators and school staff, too — and when they use language that supports it.
- Language works when it is encouraging, but it shouldn't offer false praise and should reward effort while honestly assessing a student’s progress. Negative phrases such as “this is too hard” have been banned in one White Pines, NV, classroom, replaced with, "I’m not sure how to do this yet."
- One district in Utah has reduced the number of F's given to its students by 30% over two years, encourages teachers to have students grade themselves where possible, and allows them to retake tests when homework shows they could do better, while another district gives students more say in what they do in class.
Dive Insight:
The article lists 10 growth mindset practices that educators say have improved student behavior and performance, including the use of positive language, more student control over the class and their work and efforts to build trust, encouraging minority students, and increasing opportunity for students to advance, including with more inclusive advanced classes.
An Edutopia article also describes several methods to help develop a growth mindset school-wide: teachers and administrators modeling it, opportunities for teachers to have freedom to try new approaches, and staff development on the topic
A recent Education Week survey of 600 teachers showed nearly all believed that a growth mindset improves teaching and helps students learn, but only about 20% were confident they could help students achieve it.
Meanwhile, Stanford Professor Carol Dweck, who is credited with developing the theory, recently has also expressed concern that some educators are confidently announcing success with the approach but have a “false growth mindset.” She believes it requires hard work to move along her continuum to having a growth mindset, where on one end students believe success comes from learning, persistence and hard work. On the other, they have a fixed mindset and believe achievement is related to innate qualities.