Last week, I referenced how my family and home life went a long way in developing the fixed mindset. Today, I want to consider how school can lead to a fixed mindset.
I think the perpetuated fixed mindset in school can be pretty obvious as shown above. I actually worked with a teacher several years ago who turned a very bright rising math genius into a failing math student by telling her she wasn’t the smartest or the best student at math. We can’t help ourselves as teachers praising the smarts and natural abilities of some while expressing frustration and angst at the inabilities of others. We inadvertently make the former feel more stressed and the latter feel like there is an impossible standard.
I had a sweet and very naturally smart student last year. I’ll call her Sweetie. Sweetie did not excel in Math, but she had the talented and gifted label and definitely thought outside the box. Not long into the year, we found out from mom that Sweetie was having serious stomach problems. I remember wondering if I was contributing in anyway to her stress. Maybe my fixed mindset or just my need for sanity, I had to push past those thoughts and tell myself it wasn’t my fault, but what could I do to help. Looking back, I think we too often take the position that it’s not our faults – but what if it is? What if we are perpetuating the fixed mindset and these nervous stomach issues?
It’s dawning on me just how entrenched, just how tightly fixed my mindset is.
Below are part of my first week lesson plans. I scripted them in detail to be very intentional about making growth mindset statements. I also wanted to plan a few lessons to purposefully teach them about how their brain works and the growth mindset. These are the first two. I would love feedback or how anyone else has taught growth mindset in their classrooms!
- Wednesday, August 25th
- Play energetic music as students enter. Go over the entering expectations and have them practice a few times (5-10 minutes)
- Today, I want to review our rules and procedures just a little bit to get us more familiar and comfortable with them. Let’s get started with a refresher. What is one rule from yesterday or would anyone like to demonstrate a procedure for us?
- We’re going to start Unit 0 today! That’s right – we have a pre-unit. Like an introduction to a good book. Let’s open to our table of contents and write Unit O: Growing our Minds – Page I – 8/26/2015. Then turn to page 1. I’d like you to write in big bold letters – Unit 0: Growing our Minds. We’ll come back to decorating this page more later.
- We’re going to start with a little experiment. Let’s get our notebooks ready. Go back to the table of contents. Let’s call this . . . page 2, 3. You’ll find some new supplies in the buckets on your team’s supply chart. There are toothpicks and gumdrops. Your task is to create a structure that will hold a book for at least ten minutes. You are to work with and stay with your team. Remember our rule of respecting others – that means not touching and that means how we talk to each other. You will have fifteen minutes to build your structure including testing and rebuilding it if necessary and draw a picture of your creation. We will test them at the end. Go! (Play energetic music)
- Test the structures and have students record the results of their structure, then have a brief discussion regarding what might have helped them build a better structure? What difficulties did they encounter? We are going to begin a discussion of mindset and how with hard work and effort anyone can attain what they set out to.
- RIght now I have a little survey about how we learn. I’ll project it on the board and you can record your answers on the page opposite of the experiment. *If there’s time, begin to discuss their answers, otherwise – we’re going to talk more about this tomorrow.
- Review cleaning up and leaving procedures.
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- Thursday, August 26th
- Play meditative music as students enter. Practice entering routines.
- Ask if students have had any trouble with any procedure or rule that they want to discuss.
- Yesterday we began to talk a little about mindsets. *If there wasn’t time yesterday, discuss the results of quiz. If we did, briefly review. Ask: How many of you are good at math? Reading? Science? Social Studies or History? What about school? Now what about the opposite, how many of you think you’re no good at math? reading? Science? history? School? I have a secret to share with you – someone else wasn’t good at school – let’s watch:
- Let me tell you my story. I wasn’t like Steve. I was like some of you – school was easy for me. I was called talented and gifted and took all the hard classes in middle school and high school. Everyone told me I was smart. Math came kind of easy for me as well. When I got into college, I was going to be a computer engineer. I liked Math, I liked computers – I was smart, right?! But everything had been kind of easy, I had never had to really work hard. So guess what happened when I got into some really difficult math and computer science classes?! I failed!! Big time failed! I blamed the teachers and the circumstances – and that I was a girl (girls aren’t supposed to be good at math). Ultimately, I decided instead of working harder and retaking the classes – I decided I had reached the end of my ability and went for a different degree studying history and the Bible. It was hard, but not like the math hard. A few years ago, someone came to the school where I was teaching and told us about the two kinds of mindsets. I immediately realized I had a fixed mindset and was so encouraged that I could change it! I still have to work on having this mindset. I find the fixed mindset creeping in at times. But you know what?! I’m learning how to hear it and talk back to it and tell that voice NO!
- I’m going to teach y’all that this year! How to have a growth mindset. And you know what else?! You’re going to help me because sometimes I’ll get stuck in that fixed mindset. Let’s go back to our unit cover page from yesterday and add some pictures now that we have a better understanding – you can add pictures and/or words. You have five (maybe ten?) minutes
- Just this summer I had to learn how to use technology better. I’m pretty good with computers but sometimes I get stuck. Well, I took that growth mindset and kept at it. I think y’all are in for some fun because of it! And if I can learn that, y’all can too! You can learn anything!
- We’re going to put this into practice. I have a few statements on the board that come from a fixed mindset. (Assign a number to each partner group.) You and your partner’s job is to think of something better to say – like the opposite. Make the negative into a positive statement. You have five minutes! Go! (Play energetic music) https://docs.google.com/a/pisd.edu/presentation/d/1reoSEFAphlWJTNgAfFOTLbdtURQPZRFQSlwCiOKgg_8/edit?usp=sharing
- Ask for the positive ideas students came up with. Record on the powerpoint. Then click to reveal – here are some other ideas someone came up with to turn a fixed mindset into a growth mindset. I created a poster to hang in our room. I actually want you to help me decide where to put it. I’m going to ask the other classes as well. I have a couple of ideas, but I’ll let y’all ultimately decide. At the end of the day, I’ll hang it in the most popular place. 🙂 I made little copies for us to put in our notebooks as well. Let’s paste this on the page from yesterday where we recorded our answers.
- Reflection Question – – – – Based on the survey results, did you have a fixed or a growth mindset? How can you begin to change your mindset?
- We’ll come back to growth mindset during our R-time lessons. The last thing I want you to do is reflect and write on your own mindset and what we learned over the last two days. (walk around the room – allow some students to draw pictures if they are having trouble writing).
- Remember that tomorrow you may bring your own devices! We will be doing a little research on our own of our heroes and the growth mindset. How many of you have your own device? I’ll send out a remind notice to parents and it’s also on our website as part of your “homework”
- Practice clean up and exiting procedures
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