My Thoughts on the Growth Mindset

-

 The growth mindset provides an important framework in re-evaluating what it means to learn. Dr. Dweck is right when she asserts the the current education system drives students to chase grades and achievements rather than challenges. Learning has become a sort of performance to show that students are competent with the material, but it fails to challenge the students in a meaningful way. When students become fixated on grades and face failure, they see themselves as the problem. A growth mindset focuses on confronting challenges with growth and development, rather than viewing these challenges as a metric to determine their competency. For example, some difficult math problems can be viewed as an unnecessary punishment for students who view homework as the end itself, or it can be seen as a challenge to try and develop their skills through the growth mindset. By engaging with the material, students with a growth mindset are more capable of tackling challenges and addressing disparities. I found this mindset to be essential for the real world; while the current education system remains broken, it's important to view difficulty as a challenge to overcome and grow from, rather than obsessing over the outcomes. It'll allow students to develop grit and be more adaptable when facing real-world challenges, and the growth mindset emphasizes learning as a continual process.

 

A meme of a cat with a growth mindset. Source: Mindset Cats Blog

One of Dr. Dweck's critics, Dave Paunesku, takes a similar stance in recognizing the dysfunctional nature of the current system. However, Dr. Paunesku points out that the idea of challenge and grit can become a metric within the system. He states that teachers may use the idea of a fixed vs. growth mindset to label students as deficient. I'd have to agree with Dr. Paunesku's critiques in using a growth mindset to address disparities. While it's significant to incorporate and employ this framework on an individual level, structural change is necessary to address resource gaps and effectively fix inequalities. A student can incorporate a growth mindset and see difficulties as one to overcome, but a school lacking in resources can only provide so many outlets for growth. It's crucial to apply the growth mindset while recognizing the resource gap so many students face. Likewise, it's important to analyze the dynamic between both factors; those schools that are struggling to make ends meet often obsess over tests and scores in order to secure funding and prove their worth. As a result, students would be forced to use education as a performance rather than an opportunity to grow.

Comments

  1. Robert CFebruary 1, 2021 at 8:47 PM

    Hi Ish! I think this is a really insightful, well-balanced analysis. The growth mindset is an ideal to strive for, but ideals can only be realized in ideal conditions, which is definitely not the case in most of the country. In Oklahoma, teachers get paid so little and schools have such low funding that implementing a new curriculum and providing training/equipment would be impossible. I hope this can be fixed in the future.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Comment Wall

-
Image
  Hello everyone! Welcome to my Comment Wall for my Storybook: The Magic of Maya .   Maya is oftentimes associated with sleep. A wise sage saw Vishnu's Maya as an infant asleep on a fig leaf. Source: Wikipedia  
Read more

Introduction to Ish

-
Image
  Hey everybody! My name’s Ishan, but I go by Ish, like fish without the f. I’m a sophomore and I’m majoring in both Biology and Letters with a Pre-Med track. I hope to practice medicine, but I’m still unsure of the specialty I want to work in. I’ve been fascinated with neurosurgery, but the extensive schooling and long, risky procedures made the field less appealing. I recently read Do No Harm by Dr. Henry Marsh, one of the world’s best neurosurgeons, and the various stories demonstrated the difficult lifestyle of a neurosurgeon. As a result, I’d be more interested in a neurosurgical specialization of a field I found appealing, such as a neuro-ophthalmology, but I’m open to all options.   I was born in Frankfort, Indiana; it’s an extremely small town relatively close to Indianapolis. My family and I moved to St. Joseph, Missouri when I began preschool, before moving to Terre Haute, Indiana when I began 3 rd grade. We then moved to Edmond, Oklahoma when I began
Read more

Week 3 Story: Hanu the Dog

-
Image
There was once a teenage boy named Varun, and it was rumored that he ran faster than the wind. An expert sprinter, Varun told all that his speed was due to his loyal German Shepherd, Hanu. As a young boy, Varun adopted Hanu when he was a puppy. Both Varun and Hanu were inseparable; whether it’s playing fetch or taking a walk, Varun always spent his time taking care of Hanu. As they grew older, they fell in love with racing, and the duo would run across the winding roads. Their sprints were a sight to behold, with the whole town holding their breath in anticipation to see who won the race.   One day, Hanu woke up with a hunger to run like no other; he was pacing around the house and could barely contain his excitement. He roamed around the town searching for Varun. When he finally found him, Hanu barked and begged to race, and his excitement was infectious. After what felt like hours of whining, Varun said,   “You want to race, boy? Let’s go for a quick run. We’ll make this one
Read more