In the passage “Mindset and School Achievement” Carol Dweck effectively convinces her readers that those with the right mindset will allow a person to live a successful life. Dweck jumps right into her dissection “why having a right mindset play an important role in all aspects of life” argument. She address how growth mindsets can lead us to greatness. She knows what it’s like to feel like you’re not good enough and connects with her readers using the knowledge. Throughout the passage, Dweck focus on the recognition that it’s not about intelligence, not about destined to be special.…
In “The Trouble with Talent”, Kathy Seal, who frequently writes about children and education in magazines, wrote about the way of education in the U.S. which only focused on the value of inborn aptitude could breed children to become artful people and waste many of American children’s potential. At the beginning of this article, Seal told about an experiment of Jim Stigler, who was a UCLA psychologist, which tested the persistence of Japanese and American children by solving the math problem. While the American kids solved the problem for a short time and quickly gave up, the Japanese kids still kept on their work. Stigler stated that Asian education focused to the hard work which they believed that is one of the important factors to gain successful things. Whereas, Americans thought that achievement was produced by innate intelligence. Moreover, Stigler researched the math-test scores between American and Asian schools and realized that the scores of Asian school were higher than the scores of American schools as a result of working hard. Also, Seal asserted American education often assigned the curriculum according to children’s ability and reported that Jeff Howard, the social psychologist, president of the Efficacy Institute, Massachusetts, insisted, ““Kids always know who the teacher thinks is very smart, sorta smart and kinda dumb…The idea of genetic intellectual inferiority is rampant in American society…”” (p.212). However, Carol Dweck, a Columbia University psychologist, emphasized that it was dangerous when Americans thought geniuses are born rather than made because she realize that the kid who had believed “born smart” got bad test scores in her research. Also, considering intelligence as an innate ability would make children become quitters and afraid take difficult tasks. Because of getting more American genius, Seal argued that Americans shouldn’t focus to natural ability…
An individual possesses one of two mindsets: either the fixed mindset, or the growth mindset. In the former, someone believes that his talent and intelligence is present inside of him at birth. He is born either smart or dumb, and there is no use trying to get better at something that he is initially not skilled at. Furthermore, his success is a measure of how naturally good he is at something. To the latter, success is defined by his ability to face challenges and make mistakes. To a person with a growth mindset, failure is simply room for improvement. In Mindset, Dr. Dweck proves the existence of these two divergent systems of thought, and declares that everyone can alter their beliefs and acquire the growth mindset.…
The quote, “The moment we believe that success is determined by an ingrained level of ability we will be brittle in the face of adversity,” by Josh Waitzkin expresses how if people believe that success is based on capability when they face a problem, they’ll tend to give up and fail. Growth mindset is when people believe that their most basic abilities can be developed through dedication and hard work. Grit is perseverance and passion for long-term goals. Grit and growth mindset has been proven to help one achieve in academics, personal life, and career.…
Study after study showed that these smart kids tend to coast on their natural brilliance, and never really challenge themselves in fear of looking dumb. However, “Emphasizing effort gives a child a variable that they can control,”(p.2) explained Carol Dweck. This control is essential for the child’s growth, development, and understanding that they have the ability to decided if they will succeed or…
A growth mindset is when someone believes that success is by pure effort and dedication, and brain and talent aren’t given; they can be developed. Sam, a college athlete from the article “Lessons Learned in Losing” is an example of growth mindset as he has most of the traits of this mindset, such as, diligence, tenacity, confidence, understanding that failure is just another way of learning, and challenging oneself perpetually. For Instance, Sam was a clumsy kid until middle school, but by constant training, he was able to become a varsity player. He didn’t stop working and getting better, thinking he was born clumsy, and he can never change. Instead, he kept working hard toward his goal and changed himself, which is must for a growth mindset.…
Everyone has a mindset, whether it is a fixed mentality, or a growth mentality. Mindset is defined as an attitude, and a growth mindset is believing that “...intelligence is not simply a static trait that they inherently possess or lack to a certain degree, but something that can be grown and enhanced over time through effort, learning, and support…” (Dweck, 1). Those with growth mindsets believe that a person’s level of skill and intelligence can always be improved through hard work and dedication. This is because they believe that skills and intelligence should be grown. A fixed mindset is believing that “...failure indicates a fundamental lack of aptitude...Easy, predictable successes are seen as ideal, and these fixed-mindset individuals…
In her article, “The Perils and Promises of Praise,” Carol Dweck provides a lot of research to prove her claims that student praised for being wise, which according to Carol many educators belief that it will build confidence and further motivate students’ to learn, is untrue, whereas students praised for effort (works-hard ) get a boost in their performance. Indeed, the author has a reasonable point, I strongly agreed with her assessment that by giving students’ the label of “smart” does not prevent them from underperforming, but rather it might actually be causing it. In addition, I believed in her study that student who has fixed mind-set does become extremely anxious with their studies that they sometimes tend to push their limits, just to prove how smart they are. On the other hand, I liked the part when the author points out that even Einstein or a Mozart have focus on effort, not talent. I also like the idea of Alfred Binet, who is the inventor of the IQ test, to have some kind of test that will identify students who were not benefiting from public school curriculum, which I strongly agreed! I also like the fact that Dweck mentioned the behavior of the current generation students. As a reader, I was fully able to understand more the setbacks and the problems in our today’s society. Furthermore, what really amazed me is that how the author was able to include in her research the anatomy of brain, and the relation of the brain to motivate the person to learn. However, I disagree with some of the author’s had to say about the students. Having said that, I believe that, in some point, it is necessary for a teacher to praise the students’ for being smart, (I am proud of you all) for one thing, students will always like receiving good compliments to a teacher, or anybody else for that matter. The bottom line, besides student praised for being smart, they should also praised students for effort, both at the same time. In that…
uses animal experiment data from psychologist Martin Seligman from the university of Pennsylvania to show how some students give up when faced to difficulty, whereas others continue to learn and strive. The researchers observed how animals give up after repeated failures and as the result of the experiment, Dweck is able to compare these behaviors to those of students; Dweck wondered if students also give up when face to face with a difficult situation or continue to strive despite the difficulty of the situation. With this in mind, Dweck developed a theory in which there are two classes of learners, The helpless learner's mindset, which believe that intelligence is a fixed trait and only reaches a certain point. Versus the mastery-oriented learners, or learners with “Growth mindsets” which on the other hand, believe that intelligence can be shaped or molded through education and effort. The benefit of having a growth mindset within a student’s perspective is that they are in store for significant academic success rather than those fellow mates who have a fixed mindset. In similar fashion to Malcolm Gladwell’s study on students in KIPP schools, Dweck, along with Lisa Blackwell of Columbia University and Kali H. Trzesniewski of Stanford University monitored 373 students in jr high school to deduce how their mindsets will affect their math grades. The students were given mindset statements and were tested according to their beliefs to get the result of their grades. The final result confirmed how the students with growth mindset beliefs received superior test scores in comparison to those who held a fixed…
Having the right mindset can make a big difference in person’s life because it can either inspire the individual to keep going or give up completely. In her book, “Mindest: The New Psychology of Success”, Carol S. Dweck argues that growth mindsets are individuals who love challenges and are not afraid of failures, they believe in their learned abilities over talents. On the other hand, fixed mindset people focus on the results only. One person can alternate from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset with the correct social influences and good mentoring from others.…
According to The United States Youth Soccer organization “more than 3 million youth participate in its recreational, competitive, and Olympic development programs” (Livingston et al., 309). This data illustrates a worrying new trend in adolescent athletics called early sports specialization. By general definition, early sports specialization (ESS) is when young athletes exclude other activities to focus on intense, year-round training in a specific sport (Ferguson, Stern 2016). In our modern world of athletics, a number of factors are to blame for the popularity of ESS. It has been found that parents are the strongest initiators of sports for their young children, the next being coaches who recognize a “gifted” child athlete and then encourage…
Carol Dweck, the author of the article of “Brainology”, states that, “those with a growth mindset had a very straightforward (and correct) idea of effort –the idea that the harder you work the more your ability will grow and that even geniuses have had to work hard for their accomplishments” (Dweck 2). In this example, Dweck argues that people with a growth mindset will strive to achieve their full potential no matter how hard it gets. I figured I have a growth mindset when I was making a science project. I wasn’t that good at creating models, especially one that models the universe. At first I was going to create a poster and plaster it with information I Googled, but I thought about it... Only lazy, less creative people do posters. So why not make a 3D model? I put in more effort than I normally do, gathering materials that I have never used other than just a cardboard poster and colored paper. By turning in this science project, I knew that I could keep building up my skills and also had positive thoughts about my project. Dweck also brings up that, “as a growth mindset individual, you see effort as necessary to grow and master useful skills and knowledge… You are not turned away by fears that you might make an attempt, or even work hard, and that failure is possible” (Dweck…
The mental development, including the power of reasoningof course comes from the academics. It, therefore, becomes necessary that education should result in the mental, moral and physical development of a student, which comes from athletics because while he or she participates in a sport, he or she develops how to have good work ethic and self-esteem according to Blackburn(71). But no one can deny that unfortunately, the present day system of education has too much stress on mental development for…
People born with natural talent hardly ever face challenges regarding the category they are proficient in. Imagine an academically gifted child, who decides to learn how to play the cello. This child quickly becomes frustrated with the advanced techniques and skills they are required to learn but cannot grasp, and quits altogether. Nothing was learned from this failure, the child did not retain any information they were taught regarding the cello. In the first paragraph of “Adversity: An Opportunity to Choose Growth” a nonfiction article by Camille Preston, Ph.D, PCC, it asks the rhetorical question:”What will [someone] do to turn adversity into a learning opportunity?” Few people turn mistakes into opportunities to grow as a person. Instead, they turn from one thing to the next, giving up every time they fail. Isn’t it best for people to stick to what they’re good at, in order to avoid getting hurt? Of course, some people claim to be “untalented”, but everyone enjoys doing something important to them - perfect at it or not. Being content with life is the end goal, and if someone has failed often enough to be dissatisfied with their life, it was not a happy life they lived. To quote Thomas Edison: “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” Obviously, if someone does not succeed, they…
The world has been split between two possible answers to success; having a pure talent or working hard. Each position has its own reasons for why it makes the most sense. It’s impossible for anyone to know the actual answer. However, in a recent study a group of people found that, “the “profoundly gifted” still have an edge over peers who have less natural talent, but are perhaps more dedicated to improving their skills” (Lubinski and Benbow). Even though this investigation proves different, a hard worker still achieves more which makes it the most important and talent least important. As Albert Einstein puts it, “genius…