By: Mr. Jesse Danka, Special Education Teacher
“In a growth mindset, challenges are exciting rather than threatening. So rather than thinking, oh, I’m going to reveal my weaknesses, you say, wow, here’s a chance to grow.” ~ Carol Dweck
As we become young adults, many of us are faced with variety of daily challenges. These challenges provide us ALL with the opportunity to learn and grow individually. From the time we open our eyes in the morning, until the time that we close our eyes at night, we are forced make choices that will ultimately determine our journey towards individual success. At the Pennsylvania Distance Learning Charter School, some of these important choices include: attendance in your live learning sessions, participation in these sessions, daily lesson completion and communication with teachers outside of regularly scheduled sessions. The Iceberg Illusion is a great way help young adults visualize how our choices may affect individual success. It is not an easy journey around the iceberg, but with hard work, dedication, discipline, sacrifice, failure, and persistence, a young adult can strive to be his or her best and continue to grow as an individual.
Carol Dweck’s idea of a growth mindset is all of the things that we see happening under the surface in The Iceberg Illusion. A growth mindset, as Dweck calls it, is exactly what it sounds like: a tendency to believe that you can grow individually in all aspects of life. It is important to understand that individuals with a growth mindset thrive on challenges and view failures as a springboard for growth and for stretching our existing abilities.
On the flip-side, she explains that a “fixed mindset” assumes that our character, intelligence, and creative abilities are static and are unable to change over time. These individuals tend to avoid challenges, give up easily on harder tasks, ignore constructive feedback and view effort as pointless.
The differences between these two mindsets are found in the image below.
Here are 10 Ways that Young Adults Can Develop a Growth Mindset:
1. View Your Challenges as Opportunities for Self-Improvement
(All growth is developed through challenges)
2. Acknowledge and Embrace Your Imperfections/Weaknesses
(Focus on overcoming your weaknesses)
3. Replace the word “Failing” with “Learning”
(Mistakes are not failures, they are learning experiences)
4. Focus on Growth over Speed
(Learning well sometimes requires allowing time for mistakes)
5. View Criticism as Positive
(Believe that the feedback of others can produce growth)
6. Take Time for Self-Reflection
(Take the opportunity to reflect on your learning at least once a day)
7. Place Effort before Talent
(Put forth maximum effort in all that you do)
8. Use the word “Yet”
(If you are struggling with a concept, understand that you haven’t mastered the concept yet)
9. Think Realistically About Time and Effort
(It takes time to learn, you can’t master everything in one day)
10. Take Ownership over Your Attitude
(Once you develop a growth mindset, OWN IT!!!)
Please head on over to https://blog.mindsetworks.com/my-mindset?force=1&Itemid=908 and take your own Mindset Assessment. This will allow you to determine what your current mindset is at this moment.
Also, please feel free to leave a comment below on how you have individually overcome adversity in the past or utilized growth mindset concepts from above to work through a difficult task. We look forward to hearing your responses.
Work Cited
@sylviaduckworth. “The Iceberg Illusion.” Twitter, 15 Jul. 2015, 8:05 a.m.,
https://twitter.com/sylviaduckworth/status/621334733901983744.Dweck, Carol. Mindset Works. Mindset Works, Inc., 20 May 2015, https://www.mindsetworks.com/.
Accessed 2.10.2015.
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