Growth Mindset: Is the Theory Flawed or Has GM Been Debased in the Classroom?

Developing a Growth Mindset in students and their teachers is perhaps the hottest trend in the education world outside of Canada. Originating in psychological science research conducted by Carol S. Dweck, starting in the late 1980s , and continuing at Stanford University, it burst upon the education scene in 2006 with the publication of Dweck’s influential book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success.  The next great thing, growth mindset, became an instant buzzword phrase in many education faculties and professional development sessions.

The so-called Mindset Revolution, like most education fads, has also generated its share of imitations and mutations. Two of the best known are  the Mathematical Mindset, promulgated by Mathematics educator Jo Boaler, and a more recent Canadian spin-off, The Innovator’s Mindset, the brain-child of George Couros, a division principal of  Teaching and Learning with Parkland School District, in Stony Plain, Alberta, Canada. While Growth Mindset 1.0, got little traction in Canada, the second generation iteration dreamed up by Couros is increasingly popular among technology-savvy Canadian and American educators.

Legions of professional educators and teachers in the United States, Britain, and Australia, have latched onto GM theory and practice with a real vengeance. One reliable barometer of ‘trendiness,” the George Lucas Educational Foundation website, Edutopia, provides a steady stream of short vignettes and on-line videos extolling the virtues of GM in the classroom. The growing list of Growth Mindset pieces @Edutopia purport to “support students in believing that they can develop their talents and abilities through hard work, good strategies, and help from others.”

What is the original conception of the Growth Mindset?  Here is how Carol Dweck explained it succinctly in the September 22, 2015 issue of Education Week: “We found that students’ mindsets—how they perceive their abilities—played a key role in their motivation and achievement, and we found that if we changed students’ mindsets, we could boost their achievement. More precisely, students who believed their intelligence could be developed (a growth mindset) outperformed those who believed their intelligence was fixed (a fixed mindset). And when students learned through a structured program that they could “grow their brains” and increase their intellectual abilities, they did better. Finally, we found that having children focus on the process that leads to learning (like hard work or trying new strategies) could foster a growth mindset and its benefits.”

Dweck’s theory of Growth Mindsets gained credibility because, unlike most educational ‘fads,’ it did emerge out of some sound initial research into brain plasticity and was tested in case studies with students in the schools. Leading education researcher Dylan Wiliam, a renowned student assessment expert, lent his support to the Growth Mindset movement when he embraced Dweck’s findings and applied them to building ‘feedback’ into student assessment.  He adopted this equation: Talent = Hard Work + Persistence (A Growth Mindset) and offered this endorsement: “The harder you work, the smarter you get. Once students begin to understand this “growth mindset” as Carol Dweck calls it, students are much more likely to embrace feedback from their teachers.”

Ten years on, cracks appeared in the Growth Mindset movement when some of the liveliest minds in education research began to probe more deeply into the theory, follow-up studies, and the supposed evidence of student success. An early skeptic, Disappoined Idealist, hit a nerve with a brave little commentary, December 5, 2014, wondering whether the Growth Mindset described a world as we wanted it to be, rather than one as it is, and likened it to “telling penguins to flap harder( and they would be able to fly like other birds).  Self-styled ‘education progressives’ have taken their cue from American writer Alfie Kohn who weighed in with a widely-read Salon commentary in which he argued that Dweck’s research had been appropriated by “conservative” educators trying to “fix our kids” when we should be “fixing the system.”

The Growth Mindset ‘magic dust’ is wearing thin in the United Kingdom. British education gadfly David Didau,The Learning Spy, initially “pretty psyched” by Dweck’s theory, has grown increasingly skeptical over the past year or so. In a succession of pointed commentaries, he has punched holes in the assumption that all students possess unlimited “growth potential,” examined why more recent GM interventions have not replicated Dweck’s initial results, questioned whether GM is founded on pseudoscience, and even suggested that the whole theory might be “bollocks.”

Intrepid Belgian education researcher, Pedro De Bruyckere, co-author of Urban Myths About Learning and Education,  has registered his concerns about the validity of research support, citing University of Edinburgh psychologist Timothy Bates’ findings. Based upon case studies with 12-year-olds in China, Bates found no evidence of the dramatic changes in Dweck’s earlier studies: “People with a growth mindset don’t cope any better with failure. If we give them the mindset intervention, it doesn’t make them behave better. Kids with the growth mindset aren’t getting better grades, either before or after our intervention study.”

For much of the past two years, Dweck and her research associate Susan Mackie have been alerting researchers and education policy-makers to the spread of what is termed a “false growth mindset” in schools and classrooms in Australia as well as Britain and the United States. Too many teachers and parents, they point out, have either misinterpreted or debased the whole concept, reducing it to simple axioms like “Praise the effort, not the child (or the outcome).” In most cases, it’s educational progressives, or parents, looking for alternatives to “drilling with standardized tests.”

Dweck’s greatest fear nowadays is that Growth Mindset has been appropriated by education professionals to reinforce existing student-centred practices and to suit their own purposes. That serious concern is worth repeating: ” It’s the fear that the mindset concepts, which grew up to counter the failed self-esteem movement, will be used to perpetuate that movement.” In a December 2016  interview story in The Altantic, she conceded that it was being used in precisely that way, in too many classrooms, and it amounted to “blanketing everyone with praise, whether deserved or not.”

A “false growth mindset” arises, according to Dweck, when educators use the term too liberally and simply do not really understand that it’s intended to motivate students to work harder and demonstrate more resilience in overcoming setbacks. She puts it this way:  “The growth mindset was intended to help close achievement gaps, not hide them. It is about telling the truth about a student’s current achievement and then, together, doing something about it, helping him or her become smarter.” Far too many growth mindset disciples, Dweck now recognizes, reverted to praising students rather than taking “the long and difficult journey” in the learning process and showing “how hard work, good strategies, and good use of resources lead to better learning.”

One of Dweck’s most prominent champions, Jo Boaler, may be contributing to the misappropriation of Growth Mindset theory in her field.  As an influential Stanford university mathematics education professor, Boaler is best known as an apostle of constructivist approaches to teaching Mathematics in schools. She saw in Dweck’s Growth Mindset theory confirmation that a “fixed mindset” was harmful to kids convinced that they “can’t do Math.” It all fit nicely into her own conception of how children learn Math best – by exploration and discovery in classrooms unleashing childrens’ potential. It became, for Boaler, a means of addressing “inequalities” perpetuated by “ability groupings” in schools. It also served to advance her efforts to “significantly reposition mistakes in mathematics” and replace “crosses” with “gold stars” and whole-class “opportunities for learning.”

The Canadian mutation, George Couros’ The Innovator’s Mindset, seeks to extend Carol Dweck’s original theory into  the realm of technology and creativity. Troubled by the limitations of Dweck’s model and  its emphasis on mastery of knowledge and skills, he made an “awesome” (his word) discovery –that GM could be a powerful leadership tool for advancing “continuous creation.” In his mutation of the theory, the binary “fixed” vs. “growth” model morphs into a more advanced stage, termed the “innovator’s mindset.” In his fertile and creative mind, it is transmogrified into a completely new theory of teaching and learning.

Taking poetic licence with Dweck’s research-based thesis, Couros spins a completely different interpretation in his fascinating professional blog, The Principal of Change:

“As we look at how we see and “do” school, it is important to continuously shift to moving from consumption to creation, engagement to empowerment, and observation to application. It is not that the first replaces the latter, but that we are not settling for the former. A mindset that is simply open to “growth”, will not be enough in a world that is asking for continuous creation of not only products, but ideas. “

Promising educational theories, even those founded on some robust initial research, can fall prey to prominent educators pushing their own ‘pet ideas’ and pedagogical theories. While a 2016 Education Week report demonstrates the GM initiatives produce mixed results and British education researchers are having a field day picking apart Carol Dweck’s research findings, another version of her creation is emerging to make it even harder to assess her serious case studies being replicated around the world.

Which version of Carol Dweck’s Growth Mindset theory and practice are we assessing – the original conception or the “false” conception?  How and why did an educational theory intended to motivate students, instill a work ethic, and help kids overcome obstacles get so debased in translation into classroom practice?  Is the fate of the Growth Mindset indicative of something more troubling in the world of education research? 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Social Justice Education: Is SJE a Broadening or Narrowing Classroom Pedagogy?

Ontario elementary school teachers are now being totally immersed in the new pedagogy of Social Justice Education. The Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario’s newish resource, Social Justice Begins with Me, is being rolled out as a teaching resource for the Early Years to Grade 8.  It’s a prime example of the deep inroads being made by “social justice educators” in transforming “character education” into a vehicle for addressing social injustices through the schools.

The EFTO promotes Social Justice Begins with Me  as an “anti-bias, literature-based curriculum resource kit” that is designed for year-round use and is aligned with the Ontario Ministry of Education’s Equity and Inclusive Education Strategy.  The ten monthly themes are explicitly aimed at inculcating nine core “social justice principles”: acceptance, respect, hope, empathy, inclusion, diversity, human rights, and equity. It also targets some identifiable 21st century ‘evils’: anti-Semitism, ageism, heternormality, sexism, racism, classism, ableism, prejudice and faith.

The EFTO teaching resource, like the SJE movement, thrives in a culture dominated by ‘political correctness’ and has found a comfortable home in Canada’s largest education graduate school, the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, in Toronto.  That movement now has its own exclusive research unit, replacing what was left of the Department of History and Philosophy of Education. Full disclosure – I’m an unrepentant graduate of that now defunct research department.

Social Justice Education has now taken on a life of its own in many Canadian urban elementary school divisions. Serious concerns raised by the infamous June 2012  Maclean’s Magazine cover story, “Why are schools brainwashing our Children?” have done little to derail the movement. Nor has North American education research lending support to an alternative version of “character education,” founded on a different set of core principles aimed at developing student resilience.  Curriculum-informed parents will also spot the complete absence of critical success attributes, labelled ‘old school,’ such as grit, perseverance, resilience, and accountability for actions.

True believers in social justice education see elementary teaching through an engaged sociopolitical lens. Working for social justice in the schools requires “a deliberate intervention” that challenges society’s “fundamental inequalities” and seeks to advance the cause of “better educational and economic outcomes” for “marginalized children.” Social justice pedagogy aims to develop in teachers and students an understanding of “critical literacy” and its key dimensions: 1) disrupting the commonplace; 2)interrogating multiple viewpoints; 3) focusing on sociopolitical issues; and 4) taking action and promoting social justice.

Pursuing social justice in the early grades stirs up considerable controversy, especially among parents more focused on raising standards and improving student performance. Maclean’s writer Cynthia Reynolds certainly unearthed some outlandish, and undoubtedly extreme examples, of actual “social justice education ” activities:

During the 2011-12 school year, first graders in Toronto brought home student planners marked with the international days of zero tolerance on female genital mutilation and ending violence against sex workers, a means to spark conversation on the issues. In Laval, Que., a six-year-old boy was disqualified from a teddy-bear contest because a Ziploc was found in his lunch instead of a reusable container. The  Durham Board of Education in Ontario came under fire for discouraging the terms “wife” and “husband” in class in favour of the gender-neutral “spouse,” and the words “boyfriend” and “girlfriend” in favour of “partner.” And in the name of inclusiveness, some school boards include Wiccan holidays in their school calendars.

Such examples of how Social Justice Education can go awry cut little ice with surprising numbers of Education School faculty entrusted with training elementary school teachers. Deeply committed to social justice reform, they believe that the classroom is the front line in the battle to address social ills and establish “safe spaces” for the children of marginalized families. It’s really just the latest battle over the age-old question: who gets to decide on the best way to educate the very young?

Middle-school teacher David Stocker, author of the textbook  Math That Matters: A Teacher Resource for Linking Math and Social Justice, for Grades 6 to 9,is in the vanguard of the movement. His math problems include items focusing on issues like  workers’ rights, racial profiling and homophobia.  “All material carries bias of some sort,” he writes in the introduction. “Really the question is whether or not we want to spend time educating for peace and social justice. If we do, let’s admit that bias and get to work.”

Psychologist Robin Grille, the author of Parenting for a Peaceful World,takes a far more balanced approach, recognizing the inherent risks in imposing a social justice perspective in the early grades. Getting too political in elementary school, where the power differential between teacher and student is vast, verges on manipulation. “You can’t use children as fodder for your cause,” says Grille.

Nor is Grille afraid to pose the right questions: “How do you know these young kids aren’t just parroting what their teacher is telling them? How easy would it be to get them to protest, say, abortion? How much are the young truly able to make up their own minds?”It’s particularly true in classrooms where kids are being graded. So what does she recommend? Children, she points out,  need to develop emotionally before they can develop politically.

The controversial 2012 Maclean’s feature story provided a few of what be termed teacher survival tips. Elementary school teacher and Simon Fraser University education professor Rhonda Philpott identified one of the biggest risks: You can’t walk into a classroom and just start a social-justice activity. It takes trust.” Not all parents appreciate the politically-driven pedagogy either. Professor Ng-A-Fook of the University of Ottawa urges practitioners to “know your students” and “prepare your parents” so you do not “offend families or traumatize kids.”

Social justice education is fraught with difficulties and tends to narrow the focus of classroom activities around issues drawn solely from a rather narrow, albeit well-intended sociopolitical perspective. More recent education research tends to focus on addressing student underperformance and ways of instilling resilience in children.

Character is now seen as the “X-factor” in explaining why some children succeed and others get left behind in and out of schools. Toronto-born writer Paul Tough,author of How Children Succeed, influenced by Angela Duckworth’s research, called the character-based X-factor “grit,” but parenting expert Dr. Michele Borba favours the term moral intelligence. 

Character education also tends to be broader and more inclusive in its reach than social justice education, particularly as exemplified in the EFTO Social Justice curriculum. The Peel District School Board, west of Toronto, embraces a “character education” model that embraces six different character attributes and seeks to educate children who are caring, cooperative, honest,inclusive, respectful and responsible. That approach is not only broader, but includes two factors related to “grit” – respect and responsibility. It’s no accident that the PDSB credo ends on this note: “Demonstrate initiative and perseverance in overcoming difficulties.” 

What is driving the movement to introduce Social Justice Education into elementary schools in Ontario and elsewhere? What are the risks of implementing a Primary School curriculum with such an overt sociopolitical agenda?  Are the fears that kids are being “brainwashed” all that exaggerated?  What’s wrong with pursuing a more balanced approach in the pursuit of character education? 

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