Learner Mindset

When I first encountered the idea of growth mindset, I was interested in the positive impact it could have in the classroom, but I didn’t want it to become another label or judgement about attitude that made students feel someway about themselves. At our school, we witness first-hand the socio-economic structures that contribute much more to a student’s success than their attitude. Which is why Alfie Kohn’s critique of growth mindset made me think deeply about how the growth mindset should be used in the classroom.

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At the heart of Dweck’s research is the idea that those who believe they can improve their abilities are more likely to embrace challenges and persevere through failures (Dweck, 2007). Kohn’s essential question is what abilities are we promoting? More importantly, what tasks are we using to develop these abilities? Before judging a student’s attitude about learning, we need to deeply consider how and what students are being taught (Kohn,2015). The danger with promoting a growth mindset superficially and without deliberate planning, is that it puts all the responsibility on the student. Teachers have a responsibility to create an environment that focuses on the learning, not the teaching. A learner-centered environment focuses on the learner’s needs and helping them meet high expectations by engaging them in active and authentic learning. Creating more work or harder assignments and telling students to persevere is a misuse of the growth mindset. Simply telling a student, “Just change your words and you’ll change your mindset” is easier said than done. How does someone come to believe they can improve? Is it by just telling themselves repeatedly that they can? Or do they need to be shown proof? To be sure, there are beliefs about ourselves that can hold us back. For the longest time I believed I wasn’t “a math person” because I wasn’t “good” at it. But that belief didn’t change overnight because one day I told myself to “just try harder” or I started thinking “I am a math person!” It required a learning experience that was different from anything I had encountered before. In a supportive environment where students are provided the tools, resources, and guidance they need to succeed, students can demonstrate to themselves that they have the ability to improve. The growth mindset needs to be part of a larger picture of empowering students through the learning process.

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When I first reflected on growth mindset, I talked about using it to improve our own teaching skills, but I didn’t deeply consider practical implementation in the classroom. I’ve learned that by itself, growth mindset is not enough. Growth mindset fits in better as part of an overall learning approach. It’s not a singular strategy or tool, it’s one element of creating a culture that values and promotes the process of learning. The Academic Mindsets provides a more complete picture of how the growth mindset fits into a learning environment (Stuart, 2016). By creating a significant learning environment that addresses all four academic mindsets, we can influence students’ motivation, engagement, and persistence much more effectively than growth mindset alone. Rather than robotically memorizing facts for a test that has no connection to their real lives, students need to be given opportunities to acquire knowledge and skills through inquiry, discussion and practice. By developing learner agency through choice, voice, and authentic learning experiences, students can develop the intrinsic motivation they need to continue learning despite challenges. A significant learning environment can show students how to be successful as opposed to just telling them one way or the other with praise and grades. A holistic view of a student’s motivations, beliefs, abilities, and needs within the learning environment leads us to the learner’s mindset. Rather than a state of mind, the learner’s mindset is a state of being where we actively engage in the process of learning (Harapnuik, 2021).

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Students need more than just the growth mindset to develop the skills and abilities to work through challenges. A learner’s mindset can help students see challenges and failures as learning opportunities. To develop a learner’s mindset, teachers can create an environment that helps them understand that mistakes and failures are an essential part of the process. Most importantly, the learner’s mindset can help students think critically about how they are learning. In seeking to improve, students learn how to learn through reflective questioning.

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For myself, the growth mindset reminds me that developing a significant learning environment requires work and practice. We cannot expect our students to develop their mindsets without modeling the practice and doing the work ourselves. Creating a leaner-centered environment requires personalization, which means trial and error are inherent. What works for one student may not work for another. To continue to improve and become a better teacher, I need to be able to self-reflect and learn from my mistakes and failures. This requires admitting them and being open to feedback. Exercising a growth mindset can help me work through these challenges.

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I want to be careful about not just paying lip service to the idea of growth mindset. To help create a significant learning environment, I downloaded Jackie Gerstein’s infographic, which includes reflection questions on the learning environment. The questions are a good reminder of the structures that must be in place help learners develop their all four academic mindsets. To model the growth mindset, I’m really embracing the teacher as coach role. Rather than disseminating information, my role is to help students improve their knowledge and skills. By being the “guide on the side” I can model the questioning and thinking skills students need as they take ownership of their learning. By creating a culture of learning that focuses on the process of learning, I can encourage my students to adopt the learner’s mindset which empowers them to engage in learning.

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In the article, Carol Dweck Revisits the Growth Mindset, Dweck reflected on the fact that we are a mixture of both fixed and growth mindsets, and this is perfectly natural (Dweck, 2015). We are going to have doubts about our abilities and sometimes it feels easier to give up when things become difficult. The growth mindset is one way to help overcome the negative self-talk and move forward. But it’s much more than giving students a pep talk. Just like critical thinking skills, students require a learning experience that allows them to develop their self-reflective skills.