One hot topic of discussion within the Cognitive Drive Team is the recent release of some research which challenges growth mindset as an effective tool for academic success. The research claims to have recreated the work of Carol Dweck and concluded that growth mindset has no impact on educational progress or response to challenge. This challenges much of the research we have used to inform our practice within school. The findings of this study are also contrary to our findings within school, where we believe growth mindset practice has significantly improved children’s attitude to challenge and helped them to progress. However it would be foolish to ignore this research without reflecting on it further. The cognitive drive team discussed this article and decided to continue our growth mindset practice given its success within school. However, in order to monitor such practice and ensure continuing success in this area, it was decided that we would utilise questionnaires to monitor children’s attitudes to learning.
The research discussed in the blog post can be found here.
