THINKER'S ALMANAC - October 17

How can looking at a four-year-old’s attitude toward jigsaw puzzles help us better understand our motivation to learn?

Subject:  Mindset  - Jigsaw Puzzle Study

Birthday of Carol Dweck, 1946

Two men look out through the same bars; One sees the mud, and one the stars. -Frederick Langridge

Today is the birthday of Stanford professor Carol Dweck.  Born in 1946, Dweck’s work has been highly influential in helping us understand human motivation.  Her 2006 book Mindset: The New Psychology of Success provides insights into the nature of human intelligence and how our beliefs, both conscious and unconscious, can influence our attitudes and our effort.

Dweck’s work describes two mindsets:  the fixed mindset and the growth mindset.  A person with a fixed mindset believes that intelligence, talent, and character are static, and they cannot be changed.  A person with a growth mindset, however, believes that intelligence, talent, and character are fluid, and that they can be changed through hard work, experience, and effort.

The two mindsets are most prominent when we look at students’ attitudes toward learning.  In one of Dweck’s studies, she gave four-year-olds a puzzle to complete.  Once they completed the puzzle, each child was then offered one of two options:  one, redo an easy jigsaw puzzle or two, try a harder puzzle.  The students who believed that their intelligence and talents were fixed chose the safe option of redoing an easy puzzle; in contrast, those who believed that they could become smarter through effort, chose to challenge themselves.

Older students might assess their own mindsets by thinking about the following scenarios.  

Imagine you’re in class.  The teacher asks a question.  In thinking about the question, you have an answer, but you're not certain it is right.  Would you raise your hand?  A student with a fixed mindset most likely would not raise her hand, for fear of giving the wrong answer.  The student with a fixed mindset sees a wrong answer as a threat to her ego since she sees being wrong as a final judgment on her lack of intelligence.  A student with a growth mindset, however, would most likely raise her hand, seeing it as a win-win scenario and as an opportunity to check her understanding of her learning.  If she is right, she will confirm what she knows, and if she is wrong, she will have an opportunity to correct her misunderstanding.

Imagine a second scenario.  You are in class the day after completing a test.  You did not do very well.  The teacher then offers you a choice.  One, you can look at the tests of students who did worse than you did, or two, you can look at the tests of students who scored higher than you did.  Which would you choose?  In this scenario, students with a fixed mindset typically choose to look at the tests of students who did worse than they did since this helps them feel better about themselves.  Students with a growth mindset, however, chose to look at the tests of those who scored higher than they did since this offers an opportunity to see what they got wrong and to correct their mistakes.

At the core of each of the two mindsets is a distinctly different attitude toward failure and learning.  For the person with a fixed mindset, failure is to be feared.  Since they see intelligence as fixed, any failure is a challenge to their self-esteem.  As a result, they frequently will not even attempt new challenges for fear that it might threaten their self-image as a smart person.  For the person with a growth mindset, failure is not something to fear; instead, it is an opportunity to identify weaknesses and to focus on specific areas that can be improved with effort and practice. Instead of a final judgment that they are not smart, people with a growth mindset see failure as an opportunity to get smarter.

Recall, Retrieve, Recite, Ruminate, Reflect, Reason:  How does the Puzzle Study illustrate the fixed and growth mindsets?

Challenge - Fix Your Mindset and Grow:  Write a public service announcement for elementary ages students that explains the fixed and growth mindsets.  Try to persuade the audience that they should embrace the growth mindset both in school and in life.

Sources:

1-Dweck, Carol S. Mindset: The New Psychology of Success. New York:  Ballantine Books, 2006