Growth mindset interventions
Learn how coaching in schools develops growth mindset in students, with practical strategies and real examples for building resilience and positive learning attitudes.
What is a growth mindset ?
Coaching in schools can transform how young people learn and grow. When teachers use coaching methods in their classrooms, students develop better attitudes towards challenges and mistakes. This approach helps create a positive learning environment where everyone can improve.
Key Takeaways
A positive mindset focuses on educating the whole child. It builds life skills like hope, self-direction, perseverance, and strong relationships with others. These qualities help students succeed both in school and beyond.
In coaching, the words we choose matter. Simple phrases like 'yet' or 'not yet' give students more confidence. They show a path forward and encourage persistence. This works by teaching students the tools of a growth mindset.
Positive mindset change only happens when our inner thoughts begin to shift. There's often an unlearning process that needs to start before we can learn new ways of thinking.
Our thoughts, both conscious and unconscious, affect us deeply. Something as simple as changing how we word things can have a powerful impact on our brain and ability to improve. This psychological approach demonstrates how language serves a functional role in learning. Carol Dweck, an American Psychologist at Stanford University, explains that our basic beliefs strongly affect what we want and whether we succeed in getting it.
How you see yourself affects everything. If you believe your qualities cannot change, you have a fixed mindset. You'll try to prove yourself right repeatedly rather than learning from mistakes. Growth-minded people are open to making mistakes and learning new things. This helps them move towards success with a growth mindset.
People with a growth mindset want to face challenges. They stay motivated to learn and see failure as a chance to grow. They're also open to getting support from others. This type of positive thinking connects strongly with happiness and success in life.
Those with a fixed mindset believe their intelligence and abilities cannot be changed. They see mistakes as failures rather than chances to grow and learn. When stuck in this mindset, people often have harsh conversations with themselves. They may fear new experiences, avoid risks, and feel they need to prove themselves over and over again.
Enabling teachers to follow the rules of a growth mindset:
- Mistakes are to learn from
- Improve your natural strengths and talents
- Never give up on the effort
- Dedicate time to celebrate
- Success is hidden in reflections of failures
- Embrace feedback
- Tussle and toil are part of the growth
What a growth mindset IS NOT
Understanding what a growth mindset is not is just as important as knowing what it is. This is often called a false growth mindset, as Carol Dweck explains. This happens when teachers or parents aren't careful enough to help students find strategies that connect them to success.
Struggle is a key part of developing a growth mindset. Teachers sometimes assume students don't have a growth mindset or already have it when they haven't really understood it yet. We don't have a growth mindset all the time. We move between fixed and growth mindsets, especially when facing competition or uncomfortable situations.
Here are some warning signs of a false growth mindset:
1. Using labels in praise for abilities, rather than actions.
A growth mindset is about moving towards improvement and learning. If you praise an existing ability, this stops progress. For example: 'you are so creative, intelligent...'
Instead, reward effort in actions. For example: 'I noticed you used three literary techniques in your poem. How did this balance help your final piece?'
2. Giving praise for average effort also stops the growth process. We should help young people develop beliefs that serve them well, not just make adults feel good about giving praise. An example would be a coach telling his tennis student: 'you got lucky with that shot, excellent point.'
Instead, provide honest and helpful feedback: 'You won the point by luck. Look for adjustments in your technique to prevent problems in the future.'
3. Praising only effort. This might be the foundation of a growth mindset approach. However, it can sometimes lead to no progress and create frustration if the student isn't getting better results. For example: 'keep going and don't lose sight of the finish line.'
Instead, encourage students to try a different approach when what they're doing isn't working. Tell them to ask for help when they can't understand something on their own.
4. Praising achievement without explaining the process. This is a common mistake teachers make when working with low-achieving children: 'Amazing, you tried really hard.' But tried really hard at what? How does empty progress deserve a false self-esteem prize?
Instead of praise, the child needs help and encouragement to try a different strategy. Learning to use a growth mindset as a teacher is also a process that takes time.
The achievement gap between effort and intelligence
Research has shown the effects of two different types of praise on separate groups of students. Praising for intelligence and praising for effort can take growth mindset work in opposite directions.
Six studies by Carol Dweck and Claudia Mueller looked at students aged 9-12. Students completed a problem-solving game and were told they answered 80% correctly. They received praise either for their natural intelligence or for their effort. Later reports looked at how students felt, thought, and behaved in follow-up tasks.
The main findings showed:
- Students praised for their intelligence performed worse in future tasks.
- Students praised for their effort performed better in future tasks.
- 86% of students praised for intelligence asked about how their peers did on the same task.
- Only 23% of students praised for effort asked for this type of information. Most asked for feedback about how they could do better.
How can a growth mindset be implemented?
The answer lies in the concept itself. Changing or redirecting the mind is a core learning process where the work begins at the root. Adults can filter lots of information and take a thoughtful approach to challenges and goals. Children and young people are still developing and don't have these abilities yet.
The good news is that young people are open to new ideas and at their peak of creativity. As a professional in self-development, I can act as a bridge that helps build a mind that grows through conscious curiosity.
Through years of coaching young people, I've seen they can be impressed easily but also become discouraged just as quickly. The key often lies in providing a balance. Give them space to absorb information that can be used immediately through activities. Then provide feedback on their experience. The idea is to teach and learn at the same time.
Coaching is the art of creating together in a space where students can expand their creative abilities. This helps them reach the highest potential of their positive mindset to explore more learning opportunities. This is also called a growth mindset.
Changing the mind begins with providing activities that promote learning without judgement. It also means helping young people understand their emotions and how to understand others. This work happens through workshops outside the academic curriculum in a casual, fun setting. Theory is immediately put into practice through live activities. A powerful feedback session encourages sharing, comparing, and inspiring each other. In this final feedback step, we create growth-minded people.
Examples of successful growth mindset projects
1. How to have a friendly relationship with our emotions. Students learn to identify what keeps us stuck in a fixed mindset. These blocks lead to feelings like frustration, sadness, anger, or fear. Understanding these emotions is key to accepting them. Through a series of steps, students can let the energy flow through their body and invite new emotions. This is basic human motivation that targets two key areas of mindset. First, it shows we can move between two types of mindset. Second, it gives us tools to transfer from one to the other.
2. Exercising Resilience. A pandemic has been the best recent event for young people to view as either a curse or blessing. This also shows the difference between fixed and growth mindsets in individuals. Students identify past difficult events and analyse how they overcame challenges by using their existing strengths. This work becomes more effective when young people reflect on the same strategies to improve them further for new challenges. Resilience is a skill that needs constant practice. The process of bouncing back higher promotes a growth mindset and creates successful people.
3. Building Gratitude. Younger children learn the theory behind practising gratitude daily and how this has a positive effect on their mindset. A popular exercise that takes work out of the classroom and into their lives is writing a handwritten letter to someone they want to thank. Posting these letters by hand, addressing the envelope, and placing a real stamp are all part of rewiring their belief system. This helps them appreciate the network of people around them and promotes a growth mindset.
4. Compassion and self-compassion workshops. One principle of a growth mindset is to see failure as learning. This depends on accepting being vulnerable and applying self-kindness. Young people already struggle to identify who they truly are. This often leads to harsh inner conversations. You cannot have a positive mindset if you can't accept your shortcomings and imperfections. Daily life often consists of negative stereotypes. If seen through self-compassion, these can help individuals develop a more positive relationship with themselves and invite an abundance mindset.
A growth mindset culture goes beyond the classroom
These are a few examples of practical ways a growth mindset can be used in a classroom. I believe this is just the tip of the iceberg. True change can happen when personal growth begins to be seen by teachers and parents as equally important, not just extra to successful academic performance.
Most young people feel rarely listened to. Coaching starts from a core skill called 'active listening', which is the most important foundation for understanding the student. Another key point with teenagers is their limited knowledge of themselves due to the biological and hormonal changes they're experiencing.
Coaching as a springboard for growth and inner motivation
In coaching, much work is done with intuition and body language. This helps the professional identify the emotional state of the student and build trust with them. In the coaching process, a teenager releases fears and gains confidence. They can fully know themselves and respond to their own concerns, question their beliefs, and move towards their desired goals. They use their creative ability to stimulate brain flexibility with guidance from personalised professional support.
A coaching education system includes self-inquiry and prepares students for the future. This complements the traditional education system based on memory of facts and concepts from the past.
Having more people with growth mindsets is the end goal, but this can take adults years or a lifetime to achieve. A few workshops can provide good windows to look through, but real doors open when the work is done daily. Specific time needs to be given to this alongside academic education.
We are in a challenging moment but also have powerful methods and lots of scientific evidence from many scholars. We can make changes for ourselves and our future leaders (the students in our classrooms) towards success.
To continue this conversation with Goldie or ask her any questions please contact her directly here.
