EDU 100: Issues in Education Week 4 DQ 1
Growth Mindset, Revisited Page | 1
Dweck, C. (2015). Carol Dweck revisits the “growth mindset”. Education Weekly, 35(5), 20 -24. Retreived
from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/09/23/carol -dweck -revisits -the -g rowth -mindset.html
Published Online: September 22, 2015
Published in Print: September 23, 2015, as Growth Mindset, Revisited
COMMENTARY
Carol Dweck Revisits the 'Growth Mindset'
By Carol Dweck
For many years, I secretly worked on my research. I say “secretly” because, once upon a time,
researchers simply published their research in professional journals —and there it stayed.
However, my colleagues and I learned things we thought people needed to know. We found that
students’ mindsets —how they perceive their abilities —played a key role in their motivation and
achievement, and we found that if we changed students’ mindsets, we could boost their achievement.
More precisely, students who believed their intelligence could be developed (a growth mindset)
outperformed those who believed their intelligence was fixed (a fixed mindset). And when students
learned through a structured program that they could “grow their brains” and increase their intellectual
abilities, they did better. Finally, we found that having children focus on the p rocess that leads to
learning (like hard work or trying new strategies) could foster a growth mindset and its benefits.
So a few years back, I published my book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success to share these
discoveries with educators. And many educ ators have applied the mindset principles in spectacular ways
with tremendously gratifying results.
This is wonderful, and the good word continues to spread. But as we’ve watched the growth mindset
become more popular, we’ve become much wiser about how to implement it. This learning— the
common pitfalls, the misunderstandings, and what to do about them —is what I’d like to share with you,
so that we can maximize the benefits for our students.
A growth mindset isn’t just about effort. Perhaps the most common m isconception is simply equating
the growth mindset with effort. Certainly, effort is key for students’ achievement, but it’s not the only
thing. Students need to try new strategies and seek input from others when they’re stuck. They need
this repertoire of approaches —not just sheer effort— to learn and improve.
We also need to remember that effort is a means to an end to the goal of learning and improving. Too
often nowadays, praise is given to students who are putting forth effort, but not learning, in orde r to
make them feel good in the moment: “Great effort! You tried your best!” It’s good that the students
tried, but it’s not good that they’re not learning. The growth -mindset approach helps children feel good
in the short and long terms, by helping them t hrive on challenges and setbacks on their way to learning.
When they’re stuck, teachers can appreciate their work so far, but add: “Let’s talk about what you’ve
tried, and what you can try next.”
“The growth mindset was intended to help close achievement g aps, not hide them.”
Recently, someone asked what keeps me up at night. It’s the fear that the mindset concepts, which grew
up to counter the failed self- esteem movement, will be used to perpetuate that movement. In other
words, if you want to make student s feel good, even if they’re not learning, just praise their effort! Want
to hide learning gaps from them? Just tell them, “Everyone is smart!” The growth mindset was intended Growth Mindset, Revisited Page | 2
Dweck, C. (2015). Carol Dweck revisits the “growth mindset”. Education Weekly, 35(5), 20 -24. Retreived
from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/09/23/carol -dweck -revisits -the -g rowth -mindset.html
to help close achievement gaps, not hide them. It is about telling the truth abo ut a student’s current
achievement and then, together, doing something about it, helping him or her become smarter.
I also fear that the mindset work is sometimes used to justify why some students aren’t learning: “Oh,
he has a fixed mindset.” We used to b lame the child’s environment or ability.
Must it always come back to finding a reason why some children just can’t learn, as opposed to finding a
way to help them learn? Teachers who understand the growth mindset do everything in their power to
unlock that learning.
A few years ago, my colleague in Australia, Susan Mackie, detected an outbreak of what she called “false
growth mindset.” She was seeing educators who claimed to have a growth mindset, but whose words
and actions didn’t reflect it. At first, I w as skeptical. But before long, I saw it, too, and I understood why.
In many quarters, a growth mindset had become the right thing to have, the right way to think. It was as
though educators were faced with a choice: Are you an enlightened person who foster s students’ well-
being? Or are you an unenlightened person, with a fixed mindset, who undermines them? So, of course,
many claimed the growth -mindset identity. But the path to a growth mindset is a journey, not a
proclamation.
Let’s look at what happens wh en teachers, or parents, claim a growth mindset, but don’t follow through.
In recent research, Kathy Liu Sun found that there were many math teachers who endorsed a growth
mindset and even said the words “growth mindset” in their middle school math classes , but did not
follow through in their classroom practices. In these cases, their students tended to endorse more of a
fixed mindset about their math ability. My advisee and research collaborator Kyla Haimovitz and I are
finding many parents who endorse a g rowth mindset, but react to their children’s mistakes as though
they are problematic or harmful, rather than helpful. In these cases, their children develop more of a
fixed mindset about their intelligence.
How can we help educators adopt a deeper, true gr owth mindset, one that will show in their classroom
practices? You may be surprised by my answer: Let’s legitimize the fixed mindset. Let’s acknowledge
that (1) we’re all a mixture of fixed and growth mindsets, (2) we will probably always be, and (3) if we
want to move closer to a growth mindset in our thoughts and practices, we need to stay in touch with
our fixed -mindset thoughts and deeds.
If we “ban” the fixed mindset, we will surely create false growth -mindsets. (By the way, I also fear that if
we use mindset measures for accountability, we will create false growth mindsets on an unprecedented
scale.) But if we watch carefully for our fixed -mindset triggers, we can begin the true journey to a
growth mindset.
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What are your triggers?
Watch for a fixed -mindset reaction when you face challenges. Do you feel overly anxious, or does a
voice in your head warn you away? Watch for it when you face a setback in your teaching, or when
students aren’t listening or learning. Do you feel incompetent or defeated? Do you look for an excuse? Growth Mindset, Revisited Page | 3
Dweck, C. (2015). Carol Dweck revisits the “growth mindset”. Education Weekly, 35(5), 20 -24. Retreived
from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/09/23/carol -dweck -revisits -the -g rowth -mindset.html
Watch to see whether criticism brings out your fixed mindset. Do you become defensive, angry, or
crushed instead of interested in learning from the feedback? Watch what happens when you see an
educator who’s better than you at something you value. Do you feel envious and threatened, or do you
feel eager to learn? Accept those thoughts and feelings and work with and through them. And keep
wor king with and through them.
My colleagues and I are taking a growth -mindset stance toward our message to educators. Maybe we
originally put too much emphasis on sheer effort. Maybe we made the development of a growth
mindset sound too easy. Maybe we talked too much about people having one mindset or the other,
rather than portraying people as mixtures. We are on a growth -mindset journey, too. Growth Mindset, Revisited Page | 4
Dweck, C. (2015). Carol Dweck revisits the “growth mindset”. Education Weekly, 35(5), 20 -24. Retreived
from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2015/09/23/carol -dweck -revisits -the -g rowth -mindset.html
Carol Dweck is the Lewis and Virginia Eaton professor of psychology at Stanford University and the
author of Mi ndset: The New Psychology of Success (Ballantine Books).
Vol. 35, Issue 05, Pages 20,24
