Growth Mindset: Resources

In my last post, Growth Mindset: Flexibility, I introduced what is commonly referred to as a Growth Mindset. I talked about how having this mindset can help students learn and overcome adversity, such as what we are experiencing right now. A few parents reached out asking for resources on how they can instill this mindset in their child. I will be covering the growth mindset stances - resilience, perseverance, flexibility, empathy and optimism - in separate posts with guidance for families. 

In general, picture books are great teaching tools. While it may be tempting to just read the book from cover the cover, pause occasionally to ask probing or connecting questions. "How would you feel if you were in a similar situation?" "How is the character feeling? How can you tell?" "Have you ever faced such a problem? If so, how did you deal with it?" Before reading, start by having your child make predictions based on what they see on the cover and reflect on their prediction afterwards (i.e., "Did it match your prediction?"). And definitely save time to discuss the book at the end. 

Here is a great list of books that relate to growth mindset: 

These are popular titles among teachers, so your child will likely have had some of these books read a loud to them already. That being said, most children enjoy being read to even if they have heard it already. Please let me know if you are interested in any of these titles and I will figure out a way to get it to you.

Growth Mindset: Flexibility

Students across the grades have been learning about what is referred to as a Growth Mindset. Those of us with a growth mindset believe that our abilities can improve over time, that there are no challenges that we cannot be overcome, no problems we cannot solve. Having a growth mindset can have real benefits, particularly as it relates to learning and overcoming life's obstacles (like what we are experiencing right now!).

In the book, A Mindset for Learning: Teaching the Traits of Joyful, Independent Growth, the authors describe growth mindset as consisting of five stances: Empathy, Flexibility, Persistence, Resilience and Optimism. I will cover each of these in subsequent posts. Each post will include a brief explanation and some suggestions on how you can help your child grow this particular stance.

Flexibility
Flexible thinking is the ability to quickly switch gears and find new approaches to solve problems. It is giving people a chance to have it their way instead of having it our way all of the time. It involves working together to solve a problem. When kids are flexible, they tend to do better in social situations. It makes other people feel good and other kids want to be around a kid who is flexible.

To teach flexibility to your child, check out the suggestions from Encourage Play (click image):

As your child faces problems, challenge them to consider multiple solutions. Get them to think about the consequences of each and how others might think and feel. What is the best solution that would meet the needs of others? I would suggest using the "flexible" language: "Are you being flexible?" "What could you do to demonstrate a flexible mind?"

I will continue to post related resources as I find them. In the meantime, keep up the hard work!

(Source: Understood.org - 1, Understood.org - 2)