Growth Mindset.

 

Carol Dweck Says Theory of Educational Mind-Set Is Often Misunderstood. Cheezburger.

The concept of growth mindset sounds familiar, but I don't recall ever officially learning about it or attempting it for myself. Personally, I think implementing growth mindset into the educational system would have drastic changes in how children view their own education, and hopefully for the better. Though my experience is anecdotal, I didn't struggle educationally until I got into college because I was the child who did everything they were told, and even if I did struggle I simply would be told that I'd get through it. Of course I did, but I still struggle periodically because of this. So, I think it's in the best interests of the children to not make learning feel like a competition, or that if they're behind that they're not as good as their classmates, etc. Naturally, as children grow up they're going to become competitive and be put into these types of environments, however, I think it's entirely unnecessary to make learning feel like an abysmal experience.

That said, my experience at OU has resulted in me having to tell myself that not always having fantastic grades and work is perfectly acceptable. Once it finally hit home that not everything is going to be perfect all the time, I definitely can say that I've become more comfortable with my work. This is especially true for my papers, since that's primarily what I work on, and I have to accept the fact that they're going to be critiqued and I might not like everything that's said about my work. But once I got over that, again I'm way more comfortable with my work. In a roundabout way, I managed to self-impose a growth mindset onto myself, but it's still a process. If possible, I believe that growth mindset type of learning should be implemented early on, that way children are not forced to figure things out so late in their life. It will make things run more smoothly.