The discussion of  growth mindset has been really popular lately.  I say this because both my school, and my wife’s school gave us each a copy of Carol Dweck’s book as summer reading.  In the downtime between my honeymoon trip to South East Asia I read Carol Dweck’s book Mindset as part of the Coast2Coast reading project.  The book brought a lot of ideas about how people’s minds are set, or what types of thinking patterns they lend themselves towards, and how they ultimately lead to success. You don’t need to read the entire book to understand the concepts behind it (You can probably get by with chapters 1,2& 7, and maybe also 3 & 8).

What Is This Mindset Stuff?

In the book, Dweck sets out two options for mindsets. Fixed, someone who thinks that their ability is innate and unchangable, and growth who believes that their abilites can be changed through learning and effort. This a brief explanation of this concept that is really diverse, but for a more detailed explanation you can watch this Ted Talk from Eduardo Briceno:

After learning the basics, tt seems obvious that our schools should be training people to develop a  growth mindset, and in Dweck’s book there is an overwhelming host of examples for why that should be the case.  From Relationships to business to parenting, Dweck provides an exhausting number of all the various ways a fixed and growth mindset could show up in real life.  The case studies that she provides are instructive, but for an educator, the book leaves you wanting a more in-dept, step-by-step treatment of how to foster and deepen a growth mindset in students and transition students away from a fixed mindset.  While I can’t promise to provide that, I plan to explore more of these ideas in the upcoming days and document what I’m thinking here.  There are probably a number of other resources for educators for surrounding how to do this with a classroom of students, and I will try to find them.  I want to think about ways to help kids understand their own mindset and take steps to change it.  I also want to give feedback in a way not to push kids towards a fixed mindset.  As I think about what is important to implement in my classroom this fall, I plan to share those ideas here in the days to come.
What are your thoughts about Mindset?  Put your thoughts in the comments.