Often, when correcting a mistake, teachers or coaches ask for more effort or acknowledge that the young person has worked hard and give them credit for it. Certainly, it’s essential to recognize the effort put into an activity, but for those guiding the learning, it is not enough to do just that.
Many parents or teachers say to praise effort, not the outcome. Personally, I think that’s wrong: you should praise the effort that led to the outcome or learning progress; tie the praise to that. It’s not just about effort but also about strategy. The student should be supported in finding another strategy. Effective teachers and coaches who foster a growth mindset in young people consistently support learning strategies and show how those strategies led to success.
Carol Dweck rightly argues that many parents and teachers who have a growth mindset themselves still fail to convey it to children, as they try to protect their confidence, focus on their abilities, and boost their self-esteem or shield them from failure. However, this approach inadvertently conveys anxiety about abilities.
Together with Kyla Haimovitz, Dweck has shown that the way a parent reacts to a child’s failure conveys a mindset, regardless of the parent’s own mindset. If parents react to their child’s failures as though they were something negative, rushing in, showing anxiety, and reassuring them by saying, “Oh, not everyone is good at math, don’t worry, you’re good at other things,” the child perceives this as something important and fixed. This way, the child develops a fixed mindset, even if the parent has a growth mindset.
If, on the other hand, the parent reacts to a child’s failure as an opportunity to improve learning, saying, “Okay, what does this experience teach us? What’s the next step? Should we talk to the teacher to understand how to learn this better?” then the child comes to understand that abilities can be developed.
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