Growth Mindset
This was the first time for me hearing of Carol Deweck and the power of growth mindset. I have heard of similar topics but never in this context. I believe it is a topic worth talking about because it involves how people raise their children and the mindset they grow up with. I think that I fall on the level between the easy mid set and the growth mindset, but I think it depends on the subject and how interested in it I am. For example... I really enjoy this class because I get to express my own opinion and each assignment is up to your own imagination so I work hard on these assignments because its something to be proud of. However, in classes like organic chemistry where it is really challenging sometimes, i found myself really discouraged and felt like a failure because I was only rewarding the end result and not my progress throughout the course.
I do feel like Carol is missing a few key points to her argument. Americas schooling is in no way perfect, and we have certain standards of criteria that must be met for each grade level. I'm sure kids enjoy pushing their learning curve in one way or another but our schools use traditional grading. We can make the standard for one child different from the others because we would like to give every child the same education. I think one way to maybe work towards what Carol would like to see happen is open learning abilities for students in classes and make class sizes smaller. Kids learn better when they aren't surrounded by 30 other kids trying to learn the same thing. We all have different learning abilities which is why I think all classes should have visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learning opportunities.
My mother is a 4th grade teacher and she teaches in OKC where the majority of students are Latino. Most of their parents speak very little English, but their kids can translate for them. Its very interesting to go to my mother school and see how bright these children are. Although, every year my mother has students who aren't as capable of learning as others. She spends extra time after school helping those students catch up just so they can complete their work. Students will fall behind because of the way they learn (visual, auditory, and kinesthetic because schools don't offer those teaching methods. My mother and I have also found that students learn better when they are not taught by someone with strong authority. I have gone in several times to my mothers school and helped the kids with math and science. They respond better to my style of teaching because i could explain it better in other ways that my mom may not be aware of. By the end of the year my mothers class had the highest test schools in the whole district, which i think speaks for itself.
This brings me to my counterpoint from of of the articles i read from Education Week. Dave Paunesku talks about the challenges of teaching to a default system. He says "When data reveal students' shortcomings without revealing the shortcomings of the systems intended to serve them, it becomes easier to treat students as deficient and harder to recognize how those systems must be changed to create more equitable opportunities." I think this statement has so much insight behind it because we treat students as if they are the problem and don't look into the school systems learning abilities.
I do feel like Carol is missing a few key points to her argument. Americas schooling is in no way perfect, and we have certain standards of criteria that must be met for each grade level. I'm sure kids enjoy pushing their learning curve in one way or another but our schools use traditional grading. We can make the standard for one child different from the others because we would like to give every child the same education. I think one way to maybe work towards what Carol would like to see happen is open learning abilities for students in classes and make class sizes smaller. Kids learn better when they aren't surrounded by 30 other kids trying to learn the same thing. We all have different learning abilities which is why I think all classes should have visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learning opportunities.
My mother is a 4th grade teacher and she teaches in OKC where the majority of students are Latino. Most of their parents speak very little English, but their kids can translate for them. Its very interesting to go to my mother school and see how bright these children are. Although, every year my mother has students who aren't as capable of learning as others. She spends extra time after school helping those students catch up just so they can complete their work. Students will fall behind because of the way they learn (visual, auditory, and kinesthetic because schools don't offer those teaching methods. My mother and I have also found that students learn better when they are not taught by someone with strong authority. I have gone in several times to my mothers school and helped the kids with math and science. They respond better to my style of teaching because i could explain it better in other ways that my mom may not be aware of. By the end of the year my mothers class had the highest test schools in the whole district, which i think speaks for itself.
This brings me to my counterpoint from of of the articles i read from Education Week. Dave Paunesku talks about the challenges of teaching to a default system. He says "When data reveal students' shortcomings without revealing the shortcomings of the systems intended to serve them, it becomes easier to treat students as deficient and harder to recognize how those systems must be changed to create more equitable opportunities." I think this statement has so much insight behind it because we treat students as if they are the problem and don't look into the school systems learning abilities.
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| Here is an example of different learning styles I mentioned |
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