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Growth Mindset, Grit, Resilience
In this post, I'm going to be succinct. Really.
I am *not* going to talk about metacognition. (I've already done that a lot in other Scholar updates.) But I'll comment on some related concepts that also support and enhance learning. Specifically, I will talk about "growth mindset" and "grit," adding a bit of information about the ways in which they relate to resilience (in the web article I mention near the end of this update).
Growth Mindset
This idea is most powerfully expressed in the research and writing of Carol Dweck, particularly her book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success (2006). The basic idea opposes two distinct world views. I'll let Carol Dweck do the talking here (as interviewed by James Morehead in 2012):
"In a fixed mindset students believe their basic abilities, their intelligence, their talents, are just fixed traits. They have a certain amount and that’s that, and then their goal becomes to look smart all the time and never look dumb.
“In a growth mindset students understand that their talents and abilities can be developed through effort, good teaching and persistence. They don’t necessarily think everyone’s the same or anyone can be Einstein, but they believe everyone can get smarter if they work at it.”
In short, it is a noncognitive aspect of learning. It is an attitude and a sense of self. It links to general metacognition in this way: It's a belief about one's ability to think, with a recognition that to achieve significant learning, one must develop and use strategies to find pathways to one's goals (including learning objectives) or to overcome obstacles or difficulties along the way. It's a sense that one can improve learning and intellectual performance through effort combined with creative, open-minded, solution-oriented thinking. It's not quite "thinking about thinking" (metacognition), but it is an attitude about thinking and about cognition, recognizing that learning takes hard work, perseverance and, most of all, accepting the idea that failure and struggle are integral parts of the learning experience and that they are not "dead ends."
Grit
This concept has its best-known expression in the research and writing of Angela Duckworth, particularly her book Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance (2016). Again, I'll let the experts explain the idea. According to Duckwork et al. (2007), grit is
"perseverance and passion for long-term goals."
It is another kind of noncognitive trait, a form of resilience, a belief in the value of working toward one's goals, even when there are obstacles, problems and difficulties. It is a personality trait that some persons possess naturally, although "grittiness" can also be learned and developed. And grit can be a very powerful motivator for lifelong (and lifewide) learning.
A Few More Resources and References
TED Talks:
a) Click here for Carol Dweck's TED talk on growth mindset. (Despite repeated efforts, I was unable to embed this video or the following one in my post. Sorry!)
b) For more on grit, click here for Angela Duckworth's excellent TED talk.
Wikipedia entries:
1) Mindset, especially the section about specific theories, including "fixed" and "growth" mindsets
2) Grit (personality trait) It is worth noting that there is significant skepticism about grit, which may not be more significant than other factors, like conscientiousness (Credé, Tynan & Harms 2016).
How Growth Mindset, Grit and Resilience Fit Together:
Finally, below, you will find a link to a web article (Ohlin 2016) that ties these concepts together. Ohlin's comments are not focused exclusively on learning. However, the effects she evokes can have a very productive and durable impact on learners' motivation, perseverance and achievement. Her ideas and strategies can be adapted to the classroom and to online learning spaces.
https://positivepsychologyprogram.com/5-ways-develop-grit-resilience/
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REFERENCES
Credé, Marcus; Tynan, Michael; & Harms, Peter. (2016). Much ado about grit: a meta-analytic synthesis of the grit literature. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspp0000102
Duckworth, Angela L. (2016). Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance. New York: Scribner.
Duckworth, Angela L.; Peterson, Christopher; Matthews, Michael D.; Kelly, Dennis R. (2007). Grit: Perseverance and passion for long-term goals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(6): 1087–1101. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.6.1087
Dweck, Carol S. (2006). Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. New York: Ballantine Books.
Grit [Wikipedia entry]. (n.d.) Retrieved 10 July 2017 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grit_(personality_trait)
Mindset [Wikipedia entry]. (n.d.) Retrieved 10 July 2017 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mindset#Fixed_mindset_and_growth_mindset
Morehead, James. (2012). Stanford university’s Carol Dweck on the growth gindset and education [article based on interview, dated 19 June 2012]. Retrieved 10 July 2017 from https://onedublin.org/2012/06/19/stanford-universitys-carol-dweck-on-the-growth-mindset-and-education/
Ohlin, Birgit. (2016). 5 ways to develop a growth mindset using grit and resilience [article dated 20 September 2016]. Retrieved 10 July 2017 from https://positivepsychologyprogram.com/5-ways-develop-grit-resilience/
Psychological resilience [Wikipedia entry]. (n.d.) Retrieved 10 July 2017 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_resilience
Thanks for the link to the Guardian article, which opened up a whole new line of readings for me to pursue. Agreed, folks who have particular challenges (sensory or motor disabilities or extreme psychosomatic difficulties) probably need case-by-case accommodations and one must be very careful how one seeks to promote grit. Allowing someone to flounder excessively does no one any good. It's a combination of letting learners struggle to find their own solutions, encouraging them to seek multiple ways of resolving problems, but it's also offering support, aid and encourage that point them in the right direction. That said, figuring out just what each and every learner needs is a challenge. And that includes, say, highly capable, highly motivated Gen Z students who might need an educational pathway that is radically different from what most institutions currently offer.
I agree, grit and resilience are empowering learning skills to have to succeed in life. As educators we have to ponder how to nurture these skills. We have also to revaluate the assumption of positive reinforcements which does not lead to a growth mindset. I think that allowing students to become co-creator of their learning and introducing practices of tolerance to ambiguity - as very often happens in foreign languages and culture learning -, they will develop grit and resilience. These practices also seems to meet the needs of the current generation (Gen Z). Read more in the following article Generation Z is starting university – but is higher education ready? https://www.theguardian.com/higher-education-network/2017/jul/10/generation-z-starting-university-higher-education-ready
However, a special attention and different strategies should be used with students that have learning disabilities or suffer of anxiety, and are at risk of learned helplessness.