Growth Mindset: A Powerful Way to Learn

Returning students: Please read these notes about what to do for this assignment.

Have you heard of the "growth mindset" and the research by Stanford professor Carol Dweck about brain growth and learning? I've been inspired by her work in my own teaching and learning, so I decided to make growth mindset an explicit part of this class. You will see "growth mindset cats" in the sidebar of the announcements blog; those cats come from my Mindset Cats blog. 

In this assignment, you will learn about Carol Dweck and her work, and I hope that will inspire you both for your work in this class and in your other classes also. The assignment has three parts, and it will take approximately 30-45 minutes to complete:

Part 1. Learn about Carol Dweck and growth mindset (and you can learn about her critics too if you want to explore further).

Part 2. Explore the growth mindset challenges.

Part 3. Write up your thoughts about growth mindset in a blog post.

PART ONE. Learning about the Growth Mindset. I've picked out two of Carol Dweck's videos to share here. If you prefer to read rather than listen, I've included links to the video transcripts. I also included a third video, but I don't have a transcript for that one — so consider it optional; if you like RSA-animate videos, you might really enjoy that video also, even though it does not have a transcript. Plus, Carol Dweck has her critics too; I've included several counterpoint articles if you are interested in learning about her work in a larger context.

• Carol Dweck TED Talk, "The Power of Believing That You Can Improve" - 10 minutes, with a transcript at TED.

• Carol Dweck, "Make Challenge the New Comfort Zone" - 2 minutes. A very quick video, with a transcript at this post.

• Carol Dweck, "How to Help Every Child Fulfill Their Potential" - 10 minutes. This is an RSA Animate video, which means it is really fun to watch, but I do not have a transcript for this one, so consider it optional:

Critics of growth mindset. As I mentioned above, Carol Dweck also has her critics, and I've picked out a few articles here that provide a counterpoint. Their argument is not that Carol Dweck's ideas are wrong in a scientific sense (the way our brains grow when we learn is a biological fact); instead, these educators are concerned about what growth mindset means in the larger context of schooling in America, and that is a concern that I share. In particular, I don't think you can apply growth mindset while using traditional grading... which is why I do not use traditional grading. Anyway, if you have time, these are all thought-provoking articles about the limitations of growth mindset as an educational movement; I especially recommend Paunesku's article:

• Dave Paunesku: The Deficit Lens of the 'Achievement Gap' Needs to Be Flipped (PDF version)
• Alfie Kohn: What We Miss By Focusing on Kids’ Attitudes
• Rick Wormell: Grit and Growth Mindset: Deficit Thinking? 

As you can probably guess by now, this whole area of educational research and theory is something I think is really valuable, and I will be very glad if you can use this class as a way not just to learn but also as a way to learn about learning.

PART TWO: Explore the Growth Mindset challenges. I've started a list of ideas for how you could explore the growth mindset week by week in this class, based on what is of most interest to you: Growth Mindset Challenges. Those challenges, along with other extra credit options, will be starting up in Week 2. (You'll learn more about the role extra credit plays in this class later during the Orientation.)

STEP THREE: Your thoughts about growth mindset. Write up a blog post and let me know what you think. Some possible topics to cover might be the questions I've listed below, but please write about whatever comes to mind as you ponder the growth mindset and the possibilities you can imagine for the semester.

* have you heard of Carol Dweck and/or the growth mindset before? how did you learn about it?

* how do you see yourself on the spectrum of growth-fixed mindset in your school work? what about in other aspects of your life? (for example, if you are an athlete, can you relate to this from a sports perspective? music? traveling? cooking?)

* what have you learned about your own learning while you've been at OU? what are your biggest challenges as you set about learning new things?

* do you think you'll be interested in learning more about the growth mindset this semester?

* do you have any personal learning goals for this semester? any class that you are really excited about? or a class your are worried about?

* if you looked at the article(s) by Carol Dweck's critics, what are the points that you found most persuasive in their critiques?

Include an image in your blog post. You can find some memes and infographics over at my Mindset Cats blog, and the Twitter hashtag stream for #growthmindset usually has lots of good stuff being shared; searching Pinterest for growth mindset is also a good way to find stuff since Pinterest is very popular with teachers. So, find a growth mindset graphic or infographic that you can really connect with and include it in your blog post, along with image information like always (caption, credit, link to source).

Please include "Growth Mindset" somewhere in the blog post title, and use "Growth Mindset" and "Week 1" as blog post labels: Growth Mindset, Week 1 (separated by a comma).

When you're done, don't forget to do the Declaration... and then you can move on to the next assignment, which is an overview of all the class assignments.

Growth mindset: a passion for stretching yourself.

(from the Growth Mindset memes blog)