Adaptive Mindset
From Fixed to Growth
Draft #1
There are two kinds of people in the world. People who have a growth mindset and people with a fixed mindset. People with a growth mindset believe that intelligence can be developed. People with a fixed mindset believe that intelligence is a fixed trait. For example people with a fixed mindset believe that you are born with a certain amount of intelligence and you can’t change that. In the video, Growth mindset vs fixed mindset, she explained how students with a growth mindset achieve more and usually get higher scores/grades rather than students with a fixed mindset. Here’s a quote she shares, “You can learn new things but you can’t really change your basic intelligence.” Studies show that students who disagreed with this had a growth mindset and students who disagreed had a fixed mindset. Growing up I’d say that I would have agreed with this quote. But doing the research and learning about the two mindsets I can honestly say that I’m on a path to having a growth mindset.
I believe that I have a growth mindset when I’m in a non-academic environment. I believe this because when I’m always trying put new things, I always push myself to do adventurous things. Also jumping into new activities, I do get nervous but I’m always anxious to doing new things outside of my comfort zone. Growing up in a home where my mom always wanted to do new things like, camping, hiking and zip lining, I grew to adapt doing new things and pushing myself outside my comfort zone and learning new things. As a child who grew up with three uncles I basically grew up like a little boy. I never wanted to be inside. At the age of 7-8 was when I got my first dirt bike. Having to learn stick shift and riding the bike came easy to me. That is why I see myself having a growth mindset in a non-academic way. Another reason why I think I have a growth mindset is because when I come across something I find challenging I’m always pushing myself till I can get it right. For example, riding my dirt bike. For the first couple days I would ended up stalling and my bile would constantly die on me. But after trying numerous times to get it right I finally got a hang of it and soon was riding smoothly on my own
But when it comes to class, as a student I believe I have a fixed mindset. Sometimes when I don’t understand something I don’t feel the need asking for help, because I don’t want to look stupid or uneducated. This is how I have always been as a student. My grades were always low because o was constantly thinking that people are going to judge me right away from my work or how I do my work. I felt as though if something is too tough for me, I give up and think that I’m too stupid to understand. If I can’t do it on my own I tend to disregard it and just ignore it. My grades in school have never been the best because of my fixed mindset. From how I see it and have always seen it is that I’m not book smart at all. When I make a mistake on something, I’m always beating myself and putting myself down. I’m constantly comparing myself to other students and thinking that everyone is smarter than me. I never wanted anyone to look at my work. I’d keep my work to myself and when it came to participating I never wanted to say the wrong thing, so I didn’t participate at all. Asking for help was always hard for me. I figured that asking for help meant I was slow and the only person who didn’t understand. Another example on how I have a fixed mindset in class, is that when we are learning a subject and I feel as though I understand I tend to think it’s easy so I don’t pay attention to the different techniques in doing something. My DPR professor told us that trough out his teaching he always had that student who thinks he knows everything and just doesn’t take that extra step to learning more. But the students who didn’t understand at all always achieved more and had higher grades because they took that extra step in learning. For me I felt as though if I knew how to do it, I did not need to learn a new way on doing it.
But from watching the videos I learned that your mindset can change and grow. I’ve learned so much from my class and not only that but also from my classmates. I have learned that to achieve you have to make mistakes, and it’s ok to fall flat on your face, cause no matter what you can always get back on your feet and try again. From this class I’ve learned to grow and be more outgoing when it comes to class. I feel more comfortable and willing to show people my work and learn from my mistakes. I’ve finally stepped out my shell and participated in class, I’ve showed some classmates my work, and even asked for help when it was needed. I look at other student’s work and learn from it. I feel as though this class has helped me grow and give me a better understanding on growth mindset. Looking back on all my blogs and the comments I’ve seen people relate or was interested in my work. No one was judging me or looking at me as less of a person. I have been working harder and have been participating more in class. Because of this class and the people in the class, I feel as though my mindset will soon be a growth mindset and I am excited for what lies ahead for me. If I can do it, anyone can!