There’s so much talk these days about the need for children to develop resilience and perseverance, to learn to be open to failing and trying again, to be willing to put in the effort when something is hard, to be up for a challenge. I don’t want to oversimplify, but I believe that Carol Dwek’s ideas are a big part of how we can help young people develop these traits. From her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success (2006) Dwek explains:

In a fixed mindset, people believe their basic qualities, like their intelligence or talent, are simply fixed traits. They spend their time documenting their intelligence or talent instead of developing them. They also believe that talent alone creates success—without effort. They’re wrong. In a growth mindset, people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work—brains and talent are just the starting point. This view creates a love of learning and a resilience that is essential for great accomplishment. Virtually all great people have had these qualities.

In a 2014 TED talk, Dwek suggests the following for how we can encourage a growth mindset in children:

• praise the process, not the outcome
• use terms that offer a path to mastery, like “….not yet”
• explain that practice and challenging ourselves is how we all get smarter and more skilled

I attended a workshop at our annual Liberated Learners conference earlier this summer on how to use Khan Academy in our work with young people. Jon, the workshop leader, said that when he gets started with a new student he always begins with explaining the growth mindset, using some of the tools in Khan Academy’s “Growth Mindset Lesson Plan”. I’m planning to integrate some of these tools into my mentoring sessions with teens this coming year.
There’s real power in believing you can improve.

One of my mentees said to me after almost two years of trying to make progress in learning elementary algebra: “I realize now that it’s easier if I think about math as a challenge…something that I can try to figure out.” I’m glad to report that she’s making good progress toward her math goals.