We all want our students to be successful inside and outside of school. We also want our students to create their own goals and feel capable achieving their pursuits. How can we ensure our students’ success in the long term? What can we do now to encourage our students, so they can develop the self-confidence necessary to tackle big goals later in life?
In this article, I will discuss ways we can praise our students for long term success, build their self-confidence and use set-backs as launch pads.
Growth Mindset vs Fixed Mindset
Dr.Carol Dweck was the psychologist to coin the terms ‘growth mindset’ and ‘fixed mindset’ in her pursuit to understand the underlying features of motivation & praise.
‘Growth mindset’ and ‘fixed mindset’ describes how individuals view intelligence and abilities. A fixed mindset describes a person who believes that intelligence, skills & talents are all static. A person with a fixed mindset subscribes to the belief that intelligence and talent are fixed traits and thus cannot be developed or enhanced.
Growth mindset describes a person who believes that intelligence, skills & talents can evolve. A person with a growth mindset subscribes to the belief that intelligence and talents can be practiced, improved upon and cultivated.
In her 1999 study on the effect of growth mindset praise and fixed mindset praise on elementary-aged students, Dr. Dweck found that students who were given praise on their effort (growth mindset) on a problem set, opted to continue to try more challenging questions and problem sets. The growth mindset students even wanted to take extra problem sets home to try!
The students who were praised on how smart they were after each problem set (fixed mindset), declined trying additional challenging questions and even opted for easier problem sets. The students in the growth mindset group were okay with making mistakes, engaged in risk taking, and had the desire to learn more. The students in the fixed mindset group wanted to maintain the identity of being ‘smart’ and so avoided challenges & risk taking.
This study has been replicated many times, in different locations across a wide variety of students from different demographic backgrounds. What this study shows us is that: 1) Children love to be praised and will continue to do a behavior for what they are praised for 2) What students are praised for becomes integral to their identity and self-esteem. 3) Children (adults, too) will do anything to maintain their self-concept and identity.
It is important for parents, caregivers, teachers and adults to become mindful of the kind of praise we shower our students with. Praising our students for their growth mindset ensures that our students find value in taking risks, accepting challenges and seeing failures & mistakes as learning oppurtunities.
Smart vs Hard-Working
Often we use the term “smart” to congratulate someone on a good grade. We use the term “smart” to describe someone who excels in academics and/or someone who is successful in their career/work. I am here to tell you it’s time to STOP telling our students that they are ‘’smart’’, as it may be doing more harm than good!
‘Smart’ is a term that encourages a “fixed mindset”. ‘’Smart’’ supports the belief that some people are just born with ample intelligence and an aptitude for success while others are not. Smart reinforces the unrealistic belief that intelligence is a trait and cannot be changed. When we use “smart” as a way to praise our students, we trap them in a fixed mindset. Fixed mindset praise can also look like: “you got a perfect score, great job!” “congrats on the gold medal”.
As we move away from praising in a fixed mindset style, we can now begin to embrace growth mindset praise. Growth mindset praise can look like ”I like the effort you put in, you must have been practicing extra at home”, “you did a great job using different strategies to solve this problem”, “that was tough, but you did not give up!”. Growth mindset praise focuses on the effort put forth, not the end product.
Check out the infographics below to see more examples of fixed-mindset and growth mindset praise.
Setbacks as Launchpads
Mistakes and failures are perfect opportunities for growth and development. Students must be explicitly taught how to view mistakes & failures as indicators of places to improve. Remind your student that mistakes & failures do not define them as a person. Mistakes and failures only show us where we must practice more & what our brain needs to study to get stronger. Our students must also be reminded that, the only way to improve is to practice, the only way to get better is to try again. This point of view allows the student to see the undesirable performance as a separate event outside of themselves and not a part of their identity.
Work with your student to develop action plans after undesirable performance and create measurable ways to check improvement. For example, Sally Student received a failing grade on a multiplication test. Sally was disappointed with her grade and declared herself “dumb”. Sally’s teacher/parent/caregiver can empathize with Sally over her undesirable grade, but also remind Sally this grade shows her how she can get better!
After examining Sally’s multiplication test, Sally’s teacher noted most of her mistakes happened with the 6 times tables. Creating an action plan for improvement, Sally and her teacher spend more time practicing her 6 times tables with timed practice tests and flashcards. Over a few weeks practice, Sally is completes her timed practice tests faster than ever before. Sally is also able to notice and articulate her growth over time: “In my first practice test, it took me 3 minutes to complete. In the next practice test, I finished in 2 minutes and 30 seconds. Now I am able to complete the whole practice test in less than a minute!” When Sally retakes her original multiplication test, she earns a satisfactory grade.
Sally Student and her multiplication test is an example of using setbacks as launch pads. Failures, challenges, setbacks, losses, & unsatisfactory grades are not clear indicators of character. It is how you react when experiencing a challenge that defines your character.
Conclusions
I routinely remind my students that knowledge is something to be practiced, gained and used in our everyday life. Our brains work like muscles. The more we use our brain to study and learn, the stronger our brain becomes.
Purposeful praise and guidance through challenges make up the blueprint through which children navigate their adult lives. Growth mindset praise and learning from failures can prepare our students for a lifetime of growth and success.
This post will be updated with new games and tools to use as I learn and research more strategies.