Academic Success Skills: Growth Mindset
Students’ perspectives about the source of mathematical aptitude and the factors that contribute to its development either encourage them to engage productively in mathematics instruction, or not. A student who believes that enhancing her mathematical ability requires struggle, critical thinking, and sense-making will participate in and benefit from instructional experiences in ways that a student who considers mathematical ability an unalterable trait will not. A goal of entry-level mathematics courses is to foster the development of students’ growth mindsets with regard to mathematics learning so that they are prepared to engage in genuine mathematical inquiry.
Faculty at the MIP Academic Success Skills Initiation Workshop in May, 2019 recommended that instructional resources developed by CoRDs and ARCs addressing Growth Mindset for success in the Oklahoma entry-level college math pathways should:
1. Distinguish growth and fixed mindset and describe the implications of each for students’ conceptual learning of mathematics.
2. Describe the process by which a student might construct a growth mindset with respect to learning mathematics.
3. Discuss the relationship between growth mindset and related topics such as identity, self-efficacy, stereotype threat, mathematics anxiety, and beliefs about mathematics and mathematics learning.
4. Propose specific principles of curriculum design and instructional practice (including assessment practice) to enable students to construct a growth mindset.
5. Describe the potential affordances of the MIP focus on promoting students’ active engagement and leveraging meaningful applications for supporting students’ construction of a growth mindset.
Suggested Resources
Boaler, J. (2013, March). Ability and mathematics: The mindset revolution that is reshaping education. In Forum (Vol. 55, No. 1, pp. 143-152).
Boaler examines how established practices of schooling reinforce fixed mindsets about mathematical ability. She also provides a neurophysiological justification for growth mindsets by reviewing scientific evidence for brain plasticity and discusses how messages about growth mindsets might be communicated through particular classroom practices. This resource is most relevant to foci (1), (2), (4), and (5).
Dweck, C. S. (2008). Mindset: The new psychology of success. Random House Digital, Inc..
Carol Dweck and Ellen Leggett’s original work in the 1980s spurred a significant reformulation of motivation theory, framed in terms of one’s implicit theory of intelligence and goal-orientation. Dweck’s book covers much of this research trajectory, relevant studies, and practical strategies to promote productive growth mindsets. This resource is most
relevant to addressing foci (1) – (4) above.
Sun, K. L. (2018). The role of mathematics teaching in fostering student growth mindset. Journal for Research in Mathematics Education, 49(3), 330-355.
In this brief research report, Sun identifies particular teaching practices that contribute to students’ development of a fixed or growth mindset about their mathematical aptitude. Sun conveys her primary results in the form of a framework that locates teaching practices on a continuum from promoting a fixed mindset to promoting a growth mindset about mathematical ability. This resource is most relevant to addressing focus (4) above.
Project for Education Research that Scales College (PERTS) https://www.perts.net/
This website provides resources for promoting and assessing a growth mindset, summaries of applicable research with links to original papers, and programs for supporting educators at both K-12 and higher education institutions.
California Acceleration Project Materials
These materials were developed by the California Acceleration Project to be used in entrylevel mathematics programs. An electronic copy is available through the MIP.