Fixed Vs Growth Mindset

Folio 2.1.1

Fixed vs Growth Mindset

Choose the answer that is closest to what you or most people in your department do.

1. tell they must work harder but not that they are behind others?

1. tell them they are behind and lay out a plan to help them catch up?

1. work hard to reach your potential?

1. work on the basics and you never know what your potential will be?

1. challenge all pupils to do their best?

1. provide challenges, expect mistakes and support students as they work towards understanding difficult maths?

1. expect all pupils to work hard and pay attention?

1. plan flexible lessons that respond to what the pupils need to help them meet challenges?

1. celebrate and reward improvement in attainment even if it’s only small?

1. praise thinking and reasoning, explaining and justifying, communicating and taking risks as they are the process through which maths is learned?

1. see themselves as expert teachers of maths?

1. love to learn about maths and different ways of teaching it

1. take care to scaffold all learning so that pupils rarely make mistakes?

1. see mistakes as a natural part of challenging yourself and learning. They say ‘you’ve made a mistake; good this is where you start learning!’

1. help pupils pass their mathematics exams as well as possible?

1. help pupils learn to learn mathematics and want to carry on learning and using it?

If you have chosen mostly a.s

You have a fixed mindset and your department will be teaching the pupils as though they have a fixed mindset.

This means that you see your pupils’ qualities, including their ability to engage in mathematics, as fixed. You act as though each pupil has a ceiling beyond which they cannot progress and the way you talk to the students gives them this message.

Why is this a problem? If you believe that you have a fixed ceiling you are creating one consuming goal in your students, to look ‘smart’ and not ‘dumb’. They are not interested in comments that help them improve as they do not believe that they can improve. Every question, every test is an opportunity to test out where the ceiling is and every success proves that they haven’t reached their ceiling yet. However every failure confirms what they worry about all the time, that they really are ‘dumb’, their ceiling is low and they are failures. What is the point of reading helpful feedback ‘I can’t do maths!’ If every action in class is likely to be judged and you are likely to be found wanting, then a sensible response might be not to try. If I do not join in then no-one will know if I could be ‘smart’ or not.

If you have chosen mostly b.s

You have a growth mindset and you are likely to be communicating this to your pupils.

This means that you see your pupils as being able to cultivate their personal qualities through their own efforts. There is no visible ceiling on what each pupil could achieve if they are prepared to put in the effort and you are there to support and motivate them.

The belief that cherished qualities can be developed creates a passion for learning. Instead of proving how ‘smart’ you are you can be spending time becoming even better. There is no need to hide deficiencies when you know they can be overcome. Instead of looking for friends who will shore up your fragile self-esteem or make you look good, you look for those who will challenge you to grow.

The hall-mark of the growth mindset is the enthusiasm for stretching yourself and sticking with it even, or especially, when things get tough. This is the mindset that allows people to thrive during some of the most challenging times in their lives.

Find out more about Fixed and Growth Mindsets by reading

Dweck, C. (2006) Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, New York, Random House.

Dweck, C. (2000) Self-theories: Their Role in Motivation, Personality, and Development, Psychology Press, Taylor and Francis, LillingtonNC