What can parents do to help promote a Growth Mindset in their children?
The best thing you can do to help your child develop a growth mindset, is to read about and develop one yourself. See the reading list below for a good place to start.
When discussing school with your children, always focus on learning over performance. For example, show less interest on test scores, and more on what improvements they made, or what attitudes (resilience, determination etc) they had to show. Ask ‘What did you learn today?’ rather than ‘What did you do today?’ And give specific rather than general praise (e.g. ‘I like the way you focused carefully on staying within the lines’ rather than ‘Great drawing’).
Always think of and talk about mistakes in a positive light. For example, ‘I see you’ve made a mistake there – great! That means we can learn something new! Let’s look at it together and see how we can improve.’
Show interest in any growth mindset events or challenges the children are given, helping your child to give them a go. The recent ‘Face Your Fears’ challenge during 2019’s Mindset Month was a great example of how parents can support their children to stretch themselves and improve their mindset.
Governors and Parents have been informed about growth mindset over the past three years through various means, including presentations, workshops, letters and lessons alongside their children. However, we are always keen to do more to spread the word so that parents are giving children the same mindset messages as the teachers; if you have any ideas in this regard, please do let us know.
Further reading…
- Mindset: The New Psychology of Success (Carol S. Dweck)
- Growth Mindset Pocketbook (Barry Hymer & Mike Gershon)
- Boosting Achievement (Carol S. Dweck)
- How Not to Talk to your Kids (Po Bronson)
- The Perils and Promises of Praise (Carol S. Dweck)