“The Secret to Raising Smart Kids” by Carol S. Dweck is about the development of a child’s mentality when it comes to their self-confidence as well their capability of learning and working hard. Dweck informs the reader that there are two types of children and people in general when it comes to learning as well as growing. One group are the helpless people and one group are those with a growth mindset. Whether a person falls into the helpless or those willing to grow greatly impacts their success as well as their future. As humans surrounded by other humans, with lots of opinions, we begin to develop a self-concept, thoughts about ourselves and who we are, at an early age. Part of that self-concept consists of our belief of how capable we …show more content…
To make sense of such a concept he provides the reader with a couple examples. First with one of a child named Jacob who is incredibly smart and able to complete everything easily in his younger years. His family and those surrounding him always complimented his “smarts” which boosted his ego however since he never had to work very hard he continued the lack of hard work that he was praised for. As he grew older and was forced into more difficult courses it didn’t come to him as easy therefore he stopped receiving the praise he desired and eventually lost interest in school. Since everything came to him without effort he was never forced to learn how to problem solve or overcome challenges. He felt incapable of getting over and working on the challenge and just quit instead. Jacob’s story and experiences helped her prove her ideas.
To further prove that we should praise children on their hard work rather than just telling them they’re smart, Dwek and her colleagues performed an in-class experiment. The experiment consisted of splitting a group of ninety-one seventh graders. They specifically chose students with low math grades in their sixth-grade year of school. Roughly half solely focused on just study skills and tips while the other learned the same study skills as well as learning about the growth mindset and the connections neurons make as we
I have found the article titled “Lessons from the Smartest Kids in the World” from usnews.com, which has a brief summary and information from Amanda Ripley’s book titled “The Smartest Kids in the World and How They Got That Way”. While I was not able to find the exact book itself, in my research I have found several sources and interviews with the author that I will use to make my argument. I feel very strongly about many of the arguments presented in this book, and the facts are very clear that the American schooling system is severely behind other countries standards. In order to improve our school system as a country, there needs to be much more support from the parents, more expectations from teachers, and we even need the government
The second rule is to encourage a growth mind-set by, “telling stories about achievements that result from hard work…descriptions [like that] of great mathematicians who fell in love with math and developed amazing skills engenders a growth mind-set,” (Dweck, 171-175). Encouraging a growth mind-set allows for a child to have more success in their school life as well as in their social life as a result of motivation and the willingness to be challenged and learn.
Indeed, from this article we recognize that the children will gain success when everybody encourages their effort and shouldn’t emphasize inborn talent. Effort counts more than innate ability.
What is actually being valued to our students’? Dweck points out, “In our society, we seem to worship talent- and we often portray it as a gift”. (Pg.15) This is an absolute prime example why students’ tend to get defensive of each other's intelligence. For instance, students’ presume that the gifted get to attend class, sit there and become successful. In this case, that statement is incorrect, you have to work for the success you crave, creates problems within the students’. Not only teachers, but parents need to realize that praising children is the inaccurate approach to do, and it will later benefit them in doing
This paper has presented an argument on how a child’s development is strongly influenced by environmental and cultural influences as well as parenting styles and education. Children begin to learn and experiment with social skills at school, allowing them to learn and understand social skills necessary for later life in life. Children who receive schooling at an early age perform better later in academics. I hope that by teaching in the ways that I described will help me accomplish this. I want my classroom of students to be excited to come to my class everyday to learn something that I hope will impact them for the rest of their lives. I want my classroom to be a very caring environment. I want my students to feel important and smart and to influence them to be the best that they can be. Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from
America is a country that currently spends more money on public education per student than any other nation in the world; nevertheless, these good intensions have achieved only slight positive outcomes. For instance, in PISA (Programme for International Student Assessment), an authoritative test used to measure the education levels of students from 53 countries, American students ranked 12th in reading, 17th in science, and 26th in math. No doubt, a question like this one has been argued for decades “ what exactly is happening in foreign countries that allows them to out-pass America in terms of academics?” The Smartest Kids in the World: And How They Got That Way is an illuminating book by Amanda
In the article, “The Secret to Raising Smart Kids” by Carol S. Dweck, he states, “The students held hard work in high regard, believing that the more you labored at something, the better you would become at it” (23). What he means by this is that there are students who don’t try in academics or are naturally smart but just lose interest in school. The quote means that students who keep a goal in their mind, the better you will get at it. Dweck also states that “As we had predicted, the students with a growth mindset felt that learning was more important” (23). Again, the quote basically says that students who have a clear mindset on what goal they would like to accomplish, nothing would keep them from learning. Any student can be successful in their own ways, it's just about how they want their mindsets to be. If they have a growth mindset they can accomplish anything if they put themselves to
As children start school he learns more than reading, writing, and math. School is where they learn to give and take with children that they aren’t as familiar with. As Staff states “relating with peers according to the rules” (2011). Children learn that not everyone will have the same rules as their parents have. Especially if their mom is a stay at home mom they learn to do what another person in authority. Preschoolers play like they want they often make their own rules, as grow older they learn to play games that have rules that they need to follow (Staff 2011). And of course with growing older comes responsibility. As the child enters kindergarten and first grade it is expected that they will gain a certain amount of knowledge. Elementary school was hard for me. I struggled through it. I guess I would fit into Erikson’s theory of Industry versus Inferiority. I don’t remember how old I was when I was inferior but I do remember struggling with it. I think that personality can play in there sometimes. So far I’ve been pretty close to Erikson’s
Most people subscribe to the belief that Paul Tough refers to the cognitive hypothesis that suggests that success depends primarily on cognitive skills. They argue that intelligence is measured based on IQ tests which include the ability to recognize letters, words, detect patterns, and calculate. They say that the simplest way to acquire and develop skills is through practicing them continuously. Children should also begin practicing as early as possible to nurture skills. However, in the book titled “How Children Succeed,” Tough introduces the character hypothesis which explains that non–cognitive skills such as self-control, curiosity, self-confidence, conscientiousness, and grit are crucial to achieving success than sheer brainpower or cognitive skills (Tough 49). To justify his argument, he uses research findings from psychologists and neuroscientists. They say that character is developed by encountering with failure and overcoming it. The hidden power of character explains why some children perform well while others fail. However, I say that linking grit and character is pervasive and unfair to kids from poor backgrounds; particularly when the author states that academic proficiency is not a determinant of future success. The big point on Tough’s main arguments is that children succeed with character and not test scores.
Another way to improve student success in Anaheim schools is by exhibiting a student that having a magnification mindset is better than having a fine-tuned mindset. “ Raising smart kids” by Dweck Carol states that “students with such a “growth” mindset, we predict were destined for greater academic success and were quite likely to outperform their counterparts” (23). Students who actually care about their education find new obstacles to understand. “ For instance, talking about math geniuses who were more or less born that way puts in a fixed mindset, but descriptions of great mathematicians who fell in love with math and developed amazing skills engenders a growth mindset, our studies show” (25). So basically people aren't born with the smart abilities, in fact, they learn their way up.
In order for Anaheim students to achieve success we must make some changes such as experiencing different types of situations, and having shorter summers to have more learning time. As well as parental involvement and strong leaders will lead to a better student. For Anaheim students to reach full potential they are in need of realizing and experiencing different situations on their own. In “The Secret to Raising Smart Kids” by Carol S. Dweck, she says that people can learn to be helpless.
Bruni writes, “Many kids at all grade levels are Bubble-Wrapped in a culture that praises effort nearly as much as it does accomplishment” (par. 24). By glorifying even average work, students are not motivated to try harder to achieve the desired outcome. As a result, American students do not rank as well as students from other countries in international tests. Giving students harder material and higher expectations will help them unlock their true potential. At first, students may find it difficult. However, after putting in more work to achieve results, they will feel more confident in their skills and will be able to compete with students around the
Dweck, Carol S. "The Secret to Raising Smart Kids." Collections, Kylene Beers, Martha Hougen, Carol Jago, William L. McBride, Erik Palmer, Lydia Stack, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015, 21-26.
Paul Tough, author of How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character, takes on a tough topic of figuring out what components enable a child to succeed. Throughout the book he makes several claims that are related to poverty, attachment, and character. We believe all three of these items play a critical role in how children succeed. We will provide evidence to support these claims as well as critique them.
Benedict Carey “grew up believing that learning was all self-discipline: a hard lonely climb up the sheer rock face of knowledge to where smart people lived” (2014, p.x.) Numerous second grade students I encounter have a belief that is considerably more disconcerting. Attaining only the tender age of 7 or 8 they have surmised that their ability to learn is set in stone and that they are either able or unable to learn and that smart people typically live outside their low-income community. Additionally, they are tasked with assuming ownership of their learning, as they are required to engage in sustained periods of independent work. This is seemingly futile for someone that does not believe their learning is something for them to possess.