LearnStorm 2018 Growth Mindset Livestream

Hello and welcome to the Learnstorm Growth Mindset live stream! I'm Rachel, a Senior Communications Manager at Khan Academy, and I am so excited to welcome you to the Khan Academy offices here in sunny California. Today's live stream is going to be about 60 minutes, and we're going to split it up into two parts.

Up first, we're going to cover the live stream Learnstorm program, what it's all about, and what it can do for your classroom. Next, we'll turn our attention to our fabulous panel to answer your questions about growth mindset.

But first, a few tips: If you have any questions about growing growth mindset or Learnstorm, please type your questions and comments, and our helpful moderators will answer your questions. For those who are trying to view by YouTube, I'm really sorry; we're having some technical problems, so we're just on Facebook for the moment. But our questions might be asked to our panel later on.

I also very much recommend that you maximize your screen; we'll be going through a few of the growth mindset activities, and you'll definitely want to see them in full effect. Lastly, if you can't stay for the full live stream, we'll miss you, but don't worry, we'll record it and send out the recording later on this week.

I have three amazing guests with me today that I'll introduce in just a few moments, but first let me share with you a little about Learnstorm.

Learnstorm is Khan Academy's free back-to-school program that gives teachers a powerful way to jumpstart the school year by combining mindset activities and skills practice across subjects. Learnstorm motivates classrooms and builds students' confidence, and yes, you can still sign up for Learnstorm through October, so hop to it if you haven't already.

There's also some time to win some awesome prizes this year. All across the U.S., teachers and their students can sign up for Learnstorm. Learnstorm and Khan Academy are free and always will be. Learnstorm was made possible thanks to the awesome support of MathWorks, so thank you MathWorks!

Learnstorm can be implemented flexibly by teachers, as in-class practice, for homework, or for both. But in order to get the most out of Learnstorm, please follow these steps: one, sign up and assign; two, master skills; three, build mindsets; and four, celebrate progress.

Of course, in order to even participate, you must sign up for Khan Academy by going to khanacademy.org and enroll in Learnstorm from your Coach Dashboard. Once you have your account all set up with your class and students, teachers can assign all the content available on Khan Academy, including grammar, history, biology—not just math!

In addition to core K-12 subjects, Learnstorm includes access to Khan AP lessons created by former AP teachers and AP exam reviewers covering subjects like AP Physics, AP Calculus, AP Government and Politics, and more. And then don’t forget to enroll your class in Learnstorm!

Next, it's time for you and your students to master skills. Regardless of how teachers decide to implement Learnstorm, teachers can track student participation, get real-time insights, and see when someone is struggling. This enables teachers to spend more time differentiating instruction and providing targeted help with learners of all levels.

This picture is of Miss Cotto of Watsonville, California. She participated in Learnstorm last year, and you can hear all about her experience on our website at learnstorm.khanacademy.org.

Thirdly, the topic of our growth mindset this year is based on feedback from teachers who used activities last year. We have not one but two curriculums based on age group: in the elementary and middle school curriculum, students have seven activities to learn alongside this brain character, Thinky Pinky, and his friends.

We'll scroll through one of these awesome activities now, which were created in partnership with PERTZ, a Stanford research center. Each activity has articles, videos, and essential reflection points where students can really take a moment to internalize and apply these concepts to their lives.

In the high school curriculum, students have new lessons on belonging and will learn through testimonials and case studies. We also focus on highlighting people from many different backgrounds and diverse experiences, so students can learn from a full spectrum of experiences.

We've also made a comprehensive teacher guide and lesson plans that include bell ringers, class discussions, and sample communications to parents. You can assign all of these growth mindset activities by clicking "Assign" in the upper right-hand corner.

As students complete activities, they develop learning strategies and build confidence to overcome challenges in the classroom and beyond. The growth mindset activities are a chance for you to make a lasting change in students' lives as they continue into adulthood—just so very important!

Lastly, the cherry on the sundae: celebrating the biggest part of Learnstorm, which has led to many classroom celebrations, is the Learnstorm tracker. Here's how it works: access the Learnstorm tracker from the Learnstorm banner on your Teacher Coach Dashboard.

Once you click on the blue button, you should be taken to your class's Learnstorm tracker. We've included a demo for you to see what it's all about. As your students complete assignments on Khan Academy that you've assigned to them, their rings on their Learners from traffic will populate and fill up.

Once your students have completed a set number of assignments based on the number of students in your class, their ring will fill up, and celebrations will occur. This year, there are a near-infinite number of rings, which means there are so many moments for celebration, encouragement, or perhaps friendly competition between a neighboring class.

Each ring is three times the number of students in your class. Students get super excited regardless of their age, and we've even seen students jump out of their seats in celebration! For a limited time, Learnstorm has growth mindset activities that you can also assign to your class to receive credit in your Learnstorm tracker.

All right, enough from me. I am very excited to introduce our panel who will tell us more about growth mindset! All right, today we have Dave Ponescu, founding director of PERTZ, a center at Stanford University that helps educators apply insights from the behavioral sciences to create safe and engaging learning environments that foster student motivation and resilience; Annie Brock, a former teacher and author of "The Growth Mindset Coach," a month-by-month guide on how to implement mindset in your classroom; and Samala Robinson, a current 4th-grade teacher in Independence, Missouri, who has developed many creative ways to help her students learn mindsets.

So, welcome to our panel! My first question is for Dave: can you tell us more about what growth mindset is?

Yeah, so, growth mindset is really the belief that our abilities and our intelligence are something that we can grow by applying effort—appropriate effort to the right kinds of learning strategies. It's distinguished usually from a fixed mindset, which is to believe that our abilities and our intelligence are fixed, something like eye color, something that we really can't change about ourselves.

Now, it's important to know that growth mindset isn't to believe that everyone's the same or that everyone's equally intelligent or learns the same way. Rather, it's to believe that no matter how smart you are, you can always become smarter by learning from your mistakes and challenging yourself to learn more.

Very good. And I guess this is a question for Annie and Sam: why is growth mindset important for students?

I think growth mindset is just really essential for students because so many students come to school with us feeling limitations, whether they put them on themselves or they've been put on by someone else. When students develop growth mindsets, they start to understand that their possibilities are limitless; that with hard work and effort, they can make great achievements in school.

There's a quote in Carol Dweck's book "Mindset" that says, "A person's true potential is unknown and unknowable, and it's impossible to foresee what can be accomplished with years of passion, toil, and training." That's like my personal teaching mantra because I want to enter school every day and just feel like I'm not going to limit any kid—any kid can achieve anything if they want to put in the work.

When you're a student and you go into the classroom and look around and there's 20 or 25 other learners, it's really easy to get in that fixed mindset space, contemplating like, “Why does this come so quickly to her?" or "Why is he so great at this and it's so hard for me?" It's easy to tell yourself the story that "Oh, they're just blessed with that ability," or "They just have some natural talent or natural affinity for math or art or music."

It's hard to reckon with the truth that effort is what leads to achievement, but we have to care about our students enough not to let them get away with the easy thing, which is just to believe that they're not cut out for it. I think it's so important to bring growth mindset into our schools and classrooms because when we give kids the tools, the language of growth mindset, and the strategies to use growth mindset in their learning, they learn how to put in effort to push hard to fight to achieve goals.

And students who are achieving their goals will turn into adults who achieve goals, and we need adults who are tenacious and willing to solve difficult problems, and so that starts in our classrooms.

Yeah, I think the great thing about growth mindset is it gives every single child hope. It's no longer this mindset of, "Okay, those are the kids who are smart, and I'm never going to be one of them." Everyone is on a journey; everyone can learn. Annie kind of touched on this at the beginning of the year.

I describe knowledge to my kids as a sphere to help them visualize it, and there's an infinite number of doors on the sphere. We've all got these keys, and it can be so frustrating to look over and watch your friend put their key in and turn and the door opens, yet when you put your key in, it doesn't work. That's not where we stop, though.

That's where you get with your teacher and say, "We are going to figure this out. We're going to figure out how our brain works, and we're going to keep going because you deserve that moment where you put your key in and all your effort has paid off, and that door finally turns." The great thing about growth mindset is embedded within it is goal setting, reflection, and we're truly empowering our kids to be lifelong learners, not just fourth-grade learners, right?

So, I guess for Annie and for Dave, there's so much out there about growth mindset. What is important for teachers to focus on when fostering a growth mindset for students?

Yeah, so I think a really great place to start is by laying that foundation, by helping them really understand that the brain is malleable—really helping them understand the neuroscience behind growth mindset. So again, I think that's a great place to start, and I think the Learnstorm growth mindset activities really do a good job of laying that foundation.

But I think it's really important to go deeper than that, too, and I think what teachers can do to do that is to create this growth mindset culture, characterized by being a really safe place for students to feel like they can make mistakes, and where they can challenge themselves without worrying about how their teacher will see them or how their peers will see them.

It's a place where they'll feel like their mistakes will be celebrated as long as they're learning from them, and where their growth is prioritized over proficiency. I think what teachers can do is make it obvious that in their class, the thing that matters most is how much they're learning and that their relationship with their students isn't one of judge but rather one of coach.

A lot of the time, students worry that their teacher really sees them as a judge, someone who's there to evaluate whether they're a good learner or a bad learner, whether they're smart or dumb. But when they see their teachers as a judge in that way, they can really get in the way of learning because it's very hard to be vulnerable if you're worried about how the person will see you and to ask for help.

But in contrast, if a teacher really creates this kind of growth mindset culture, and really talks with their students and helps them see themselves as a coach—their coach, someone who's really there to bring out the best of them and help them grow the most—then that really changes the way students feel about challenging themselves and helps them feel much more confident and comfortable putting themselves out there.

I love that!

Yeah, I agree with everything Dave said, and I would also say number one is just teaching kids what the mindsets are—giving them the understanding of how learning actually happens in their bodies, how their brains work. The process of creating connections in our brains is the same for everyone, so just giving them that knowledge is key.

Secondly, giving them challenging work, and that's going to look differently for every kid. Challenging has many definitions in a classroom, but giving them challenging work and then supporting them as they meet the high expectations that you've set for them.

Doing that creates a growth mindset culture because, you know, if the work is easy, the mindset is irrelevant. If kids are just breezing through things, fostering growth mindset in your classroom looks like lots of chances on your path to mastery—lots of chances to get it right; a teacher who's modeling growth mindset, talking through the process, discussing struggles, and valuing growth over perfection.

I love how you talked about normalizing mistakes and looking at mistakes as an opportunity to learn. I have a funny story: I was chatting with some Khan Academy ambassadors, and a teacher said that she had taught her second-grade class about what growth mindset was, and they're working towards looking at mistakes and failure as just a part of learning.

You teach these things, and you tell the kids, and you're not sure if it's resonating until it comes back to you in some form. She said one kiddo who started the year with a little bit of a fixed mindset came in with some homemade science that said, "This is a mistake-making place," but "making" was spelled M-A-K-E-I-N-G. I know—that's such a great example of what growth mindset looks like.

It is trying; it's putting yourself out there; it's being vulnerable. I can't imagine what kind of amazing classroom that teacher has where a kid internalizes that and is willing to just show up and put themselves out there. You can foster growth mindset in your classroom in a bunch of different ways, but to me, it looks like what is growth mindset—giving challenging work, setting high expectations, and then being that support structure for the kids to achieve their goals.

Well, thank you for sharing that story! That sounds like a really amazing way to foster learning. It's sort of the best environment that we want for all of our students, which is so great. Dave, I know you know that Khan Academy worked with you a lot on these growth mindset activities. Can you give me some highlights of the curriculum?

Yeah, so, I mean, it was really fun, first of all, working on that curriculum with the Khan Academy team; I always enjoy that! I think one thing I really appreciate about it is that it really does a good job of hitting a lot of the main themes that are important for laying that foundation for a growth mindset, and it does it in a really fun and engaging way—in part, thanks to Thinky Pinky, who's a great character to have accompany you on this ride.

But yeah, it really hits at some of the scientific evidence behind growth mindset and really helps students understand how powerful mistakes can be. They can really be allies in this learning journey if you take time to really reflect on them and understand what that means and what opportunities you have to learn better and to better develop.

It also helps students set ambitious goals because if you're not really challenging yourself, it doesn't matter if you have a growth mindset. If you're just thinking, "Boy, I sure could grow," but if you're not doing things that actually challenge you to grow, you won't.

So, I think it helps students set those goals and really understand why doing that is important. Last but not least—and also really important—when you're really doing that and going for those ambitious goals and pushing yourself, you're going to struggle, and you're going to get frustrated sometimes. There's also really good advice there for students and for teachers around how to deal with those inevitable struggles that come up when you're really pushing yourself.

Great! Exactly! And I guess, Sam, just for those teachers who are watching who are like, "I need some practical applications of how to do this!" and "What's happening now?" You participated in Learnstorm for a couple of years now. What are you looking forward to for Learnstorm and the growth mindset activities for this year?

Well, I really like that there's been a bit of a shift in Learnstorm in that now they are aligned to elementary, middle school, and high school, and I think that helps a tremendous amount. You know, we spend so much time at the beginning of the year doing these direct lessons where we're talking about what's actually happening in your brain and what's happening in your body when you become stressed and dealing with the frustrations and everything.

We do all these different activities, and then just at the perfect time, Learnstorm comes in, and the kids get to hear that information in a different way and interact with it in a different way. Although the growth mindset videos and articles are phenomenal, for me personally, the best part about Learnstorm is what happens right after that when the application piece comes in.

When we're doing math, coding, grammar, or whatever we're working on, and they go to do their assignments, there's such a presence of class synergy. If you want to see my class suddenly get silent and excited, my classmate manager, Maddie, will go up to the board and they watch her like on pins and needles because they know she’s getting ready to push check progress, and they want those rings to fill up so badly. They know that every single one of them contributed to that happening!

I love that Dave mentioned dealing with the frustrations. I had a student who just said, "Just tell me how to do this one!" But she just didn’t want to do it on her own. They know that I won’t do that, like, "I’m here for you! Let’s talk. Don’t tell me what you don’t know. Tell me what you do know!" Working through it, she left that day totally frustrated, but then came back the next day—not only did she could not wait to grab her Chromebook, but she ran over and said she’d figured it out.

She popped it in, and it was correct! She was the class hero in that moment, and I asked her, "How do you feel right now?" and she said, "Oh, I feel so good! I did this!" I said, "Would have you felt like that if I just told you the answer?"

If they’re taking those little moments to let your kids feel that intrinsic motivation, I think it's really powerful in the classroom, and Learnstorm gives us that framework at the beginning to really help establish that this is what it's like in this classroom, right?

That's amazing! And can I just ask, as an aside for you as a teacher, what is that moment like for you to experience, to see your students learn and experience that?

You feel a gamut of emotions when you watch your kiddos learn because you feel frustrations along with them, and you feel the discouragement too. I have a young man who really has a lot of intense emotions—he's learning to deal with them as a lot of our kids do—and he was so frustrated because on an assignment, he got one out of seven, and he was just so down. I was like, "Buddy, your neurons found a path; you got one!"

He was like, "Well, you know," not very impressed with that response, and I said, "You know, we're going to do this again. I want to see if your neurons can find another path and get two." He got three, and then he said, "Go away!"

All right, so I went to help other kiddos, and a little bit later he came to me and said, "I need you to close your eyes," and he led me back to his computer, and I realized he had tears running down his face. He said, "Seven out of seven!"

In that moment, that's why we're teachers. That's why we do what we do, and that's what we strive for—for him to feel that moment and know he did it on his own and he gave his brain the time to learn, allowing his neurons to find those pathways. Other kids see that too, and it empowers them as well, like, "I can do this too!"

So, there's a litany of emotions you feel as a teacher. You feel the frustrations with them, but there's nothing better than a kid that says, "I've got it!"

I love that! It definitely seems just from hearing you all talk, in kind of our earlier conversations, that there's definitely a certain sort of bravery that has to happen on both the side of the teacher and the student when participating in these growth mindset activities. You have to trust that your students can do this and that they can learn, and that it's okay to watch them struggle a little bit. I think that's a beautiful lesson, not just in class, but just in life in general.

So this question we have from Helen in Utah, and I will throw this question to Sam and perhaps everyone. With the demands on the time of day, where do you fit in growth mindset activities, and what is your favorite activity?

At the beginning of the year, you do have to make time to do direct lessons—15 to 25 minutes a day. It can involve a mentor text such as "Ish," or "Beautiful Oops," or "The Great Mistake," or any of those. Or it can be—I actually will show them scans of brains, and we will talk about what's happening. They learn about the neurons; they learn about the parts of the brain and what they're responsible for.

It's a really powerful moment for them because a lot of kids come villainizing themselves, saying, "I'm not smart," whereas this gives them, "Okay, no, this is what's happening in my brain, and I can grow from this!" We start with that foundation, and that does take direct instruction time at the very beginning of the school year, probably for a couple of weeks.

We try to do a lot of activities along with them. We will read "Ish" and then paint on a canvas. We make calm-down jars where the kids will put glitter and beads in a jar, put in their favorite food coloring, and talk about calming our brain. We talk about how our body releases stress—cortisol—when we're stressed, and we can't think. So we do a lot of these activities at the beginning; we really devote the time to it, and I know we don't have a lot of time as teachers, but the payoff is tenfold from there.

It really is about embedding it into just how you speak to your kids and how you ask them to speak, not only to you but mostly to themselves. My students have on their desks a picture of themselves holding a sign they created that says, "Yet." At the beginning, I had to point to that picture a lot because they self-doubt and talk so negatively to themselves: "I can't do this!"

And I'll point and say, "I can't do it yet!" Then we work really hard to say, "Okay, we consider all day talking about the things we don't know. Let's start on this problem: What do you know?" It’s about empowering your students and how you talk to them and how you expect them to talk to themselves. I tell them, "I will never let anybody be mean to you, especially yourself."

I think a lot of kiddos, they're the meanest to themselves, right?

I agree with everything that Sam said. I think, in terms of concrete activities that you can do, definitely direct instruction for teaching what is growth mindset and giving them that vocabulary—the tools, and understanding how their brains work—requires some direct instruction upfront. But I totally agree that if you do that little front-loading piece and then work hard to embed growth mindset into your culture, it's not necessarily a kind of activity but, you know, for me, I think any type of lesson or activity that requires iterative thinking or trial and error is going to allow them to experience a little struggle.

Experience trying something that works or doesn't work and going back to the drawing board. Any type of collaborative activities are really great for working with one another, project-based learning where there's not necessarily a right answer, and just coming up with solutions. Breakouts, I think, are really great for getting an opportunity for the kids to have some productive struggle when you create a challenge that may be just beyond their capabilities and let them grapple with that a little bit.

Those are all good opportunities, but there should just be things that we're doing every day—chances—and I always think that the important piece is that we debrief afterwards and we talk about what was your learning like? What did it feel like? How did you push through the difficult parts?

I think, as a learner, in my experience as a learner anyway, those most difficult experiences are the most memorable experiences. They're the ones that I walk away saying, "I did it! You know, I got through that!" Even if it ended up being a C in algebra, to me, when it felt like there was no hope, walking out of there knowing that I had grown—now that's a really rewarding experience.

Just embedding it in the culture of your classroom and in everything you do is so important.

What about you, Dave?

No, I think that's great!

Okay, sure! I was going to say one of my favorite things about what you both said is just the idea that we can kind of have this generation of students who don't have to unlearn these bad mentalities about themselves. What kind of young people can we unleash on the world if they were just super positive about what they could accomplish? It's so amazing; I love it!

All right, Scarlett from Georgia asked, "What is the best way to get students excited about growth mindset?" I will throw this one to Annie and Sam.

So I think to get kids excited is number one—just as Sam was saying earlier, I'm going to steal what we were talking about—but Sam was saying earlier that kids come to you already feeling excited about their potential, or if they come to you feeling down about their potential.

If you could teach them about how their brains work and how, with effort and hard work, they can make accomplishments and gains in their learning, that gets them excited. It doesn’t necessarily have to be like a party to get excited about it, but I think we all are excited about our potential.

When you bring that passion into the classroom and you're developing relationships with the kids and growing those bonds, and showing them that you believe in their capabilities, teaching them how to believe in themselves and how to reframe and refocus—how to be mindful about how they learn best and apply those strategies—and give them opportunities to struggle and come out on top, I think kids get excited about learning and about their own possibilities and capabilities.

Yeah, I think so! And, you know, as adults, sometimes we haven't put ourselves in situations in a while, often that kids are in every day, where we are struggling and we don’t get something, and we want to get it. If you forgot what that feels like, I encourage you to go take a class or do something outside the normal.

Because there's not a worse feeling than seeing everybody else get it and you giving it your all but not getting it. Growth mindset empowers kids to know that's not the period; that's not the end of the story, right? You know, exactly! That doesn't define me; this is a part of my journey, and watch me go!

I think modeling and sharing—there are a lot of teachers who have success sharing stories of famous failures—like Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team, or Harry Potter was rejected ten times, or Abraham Lincoln lost his first bid for the Illinois House of Representatives, or whatever it is—sharing those stories and letting kids know that nobody has a seamless upward trajectory in life.

We all have this rocky path that we take. There are ups and downs, and the journey towards success requires a lot of that. I think that gets them excited too, hopefully.

I think fail with your kids—some schools are now doing Failure Fridays, and I love Failure Fridays! You know, the teacher, too, we're all learners. We're going to try something completely out of the norm for 15 minutes—we're going to juggle, we're going to try to cook something, we're going to paint, we're going to try to do all sorts of things that might be outside the norm, and demonstrate to them that you can't do it right away either.

And you know what? Congratulations, we failed. Now what?

I love that part—the "But now what?" part! That's very, very encouraging, and I remember that when I fail at many of the things I try.

Yes! Go ahead!

I know that some teachers will actually make a point to intentionally make mistakes in front of their students so that they can really model for them, you know, when their students call them out and say, "Hey, that was a mistake!" They can model for them the kind of really adaptive response, like, "Oh yeah, you're right; that was a mistake. Help me! Help me fix that!"

You know, what did I do wrong? That could really be this magical time when teachers can be vulnerable for their students and really model that it's okay to make mistakes, and the important thing is to really learn from those mistakes and learn from each other.

Right! Yeah, I think that's very true! Because, you know, I think a lot of teachers feel that they have to kind of be perfect in front of the classroom, and they want to project this image. I think students learn so much better when they have someone to relate to, like, "Oh, I see someone I can grow towards," which is really great.

I have a question from Sarah from Bonnie Brea, Virginia. Sarah asks, "How can I best support a learner with disabilities, like ADHD, Asperger's, and so on, with concrete examples, scaffolding, and growth mindset?" That's a really great question, and I’m going to throw it up to the whole panel to answer that question.

I think any kid can understand the basics of how we learn and what growth mindset is! I’ve seen kids as young as preschoolers understand that concept of what growth mindset is and how learning happens in our bodies. Once you start with that foundation, I think it’s just really important to let kids know that learning is a journey and the journey is different for every person.

Growth mindset is not trying hard and winning every time, like people sometimes have that idea—that's what it is. Being successful and achieving success looks different for every person. For some people, I got an email from a lady after I wrote a book on growth mindset, and she said, "Well, I have a friend, and she struggles with a learning disability, and it took her four times to pass algebra class, and so growth mindset doesn't work."

And I said, "Well, she passed it; it just took her four times!" Really, it's about changing our definition of success because, for a lot of teachers, it’s just getting an A. A success for a lot of parents is getting an A.

But we have to look at it in a different way. Sometimes it's starting with a 32 percent and ending up with a 75, or getting one right and then keeping working until you get seven right. It's a process! I think no matter—my own son struggles with reading—and we talk about the way that you learn reading is going to be different from other people; it might take you a little longer to get it.

You might have to employ some different strategies that other kids don't have to do, but you'll get there—this is your road, this is your path, and you have to embrace that!

Right, Dave?

Okay, Annie! Sorry, I just think I love everything you said! You know, one of my students, after a lesson one day, made a comment—Daisy said that even if she's redefined the way she was thinking. She goes, "I'm not going to think about losing the same way anymore."

I said, "Tell me more about that; what do you mean?" She goes, "If I lose but I look at why I think I lost and what I can do better next time, I'm going to start counting that as a half-win!"

I thought that was wonderful. In my class, we've adopted that, and I love what you said about redefining success. It may not look like, "Okay, it's 100 on the spelling test every time." It's about growth for every child—where are you, and where do you want to be?

It's about putting that goal setting and that reflection in, and every child moving forward, you know, no matter where they are. That's fantastic!

Great! We have a question from Michelle from Juniper, California: "What is the best way to get parents on board with the idea of growth mindset?" This is such an important question because I think growth mindset can look very different for many parents who may not have seen it before or may not have heard it before.

How do you get them on board for this?

Well, I can start with one thought. For a lot of parents, it really is very different from what they're used to, and they might not understand—is this my kid's teacher just making up all this new stuff that looks totally different from what I'm used to? They might feel very alienated.

I think a good place to start might be really with just explaining all the research behind growth mindset. Not only that this is true about our brains but also how, once they learn to internalize the growth mindset, how they really end up being much more likely to challenge themselves, to learn from their mistakes, and to take more challenging classes—to do well in class, right?

So at the end of the day, it's a very evidence-based approach to building students' motivation and ultimately their achievement too. Even parents who are really sticklers for the end of the day, "I want my kid to learn the most," well, if that's what you want, then this is actually how you get there!

It's by helping to remove the fear from learning that might otherwise constrain them. Growth mindset and growth mindset cultures can really do such a fantastic job of helping kids feel empowered and unleashed to learn at their best and to really see themselves growing, rather than being afraid of doing poorly. I think that's like a great starting point; then I know these two have some great suggestions!

We have to look at home as an extension of the classroom and vice versa. I think just giving parents the tools to understand what growth mindset is and why we do it—it's an evidence-based approach. Then giving them strategies to help them is critical.

A lot of times, that comes down to just talking to your kids! You know, there’s kind of the old cliché: you ask your kid, "What did you do today?" or "What did you do at school?" and they say, "Nothing." Then you say, "How was it?" and they say, "Fine." You always hear that.

But if parents can be intentional about how they talk to their kids after school, I always ask my kids—we have a running thing—so every day after school I say, "Best, worst, and weirdest." So they have to tell me their best thing, their worst thing, and their weirdest thing, which ends up with a lot of funny stories!

It also gives us an opportunity to dive in: "Okay, so something didn't go very well—why not? What was the catalyst for that not going well?" or, "Something went great. What kind of strategies did you use to pull that off? How did you prepare? How did you study? How did you handle that tricky situation on the playground?"

Whatever it is! So really helping parents build that communication with their kids about strategies for learning and what works and what doesn't, and just having them draw the link between effort and achievement is really important so kids are hearing it everywhere they go.

Very good! Best, worst, weirdest—I love that! Super cool! Annie, I'm sorry! Sam, and I think the bottom line too, when it comes to parents, is they are sending us the most precious gift they have.

There is nothing worse than the feeling of being a parent and seeing your child struggle in reading or struggling in math. You want so badly to fix it for them, but you don't know how! Sometimes when these parents come to us frustrated and just want it fixed, they're coming from a place of love.

We have to train them too, you know, because they'll come upset, "My child is not a good reader," or "My child's not going to mess well now." You know? It’s right; so what are we going to do?

You really need to see the kids just go far—the strong partnership between the kiddo, the teacher, and the parent. You've got a big support system there to really hold up—and then it comes down to what Andy was talking about earlier.

All right! We’ve got our support system holding you, now let's go for some effort!

Right! Exactly! It sounds like a really strong foundation when you have that. That sounds beautiful!

I have a question from Alyssa B: "How would you recommend facilitating and encouraging other faculty to promote growth mindset?" So this is a good question about what to do in your actual school environment!

I think being transparent and being vulnerable—teachers work really hard, and we do not have a lot of time in the day. You know, sometimes it's really easy to hear something and think, "That's just another thing." So I think by being transparent and allowing people to come into your classroom or see the fruits of your kids' labor, let your kids lead things.

Let your kids be the ones who go out and talk about things. That's where the power lies, and that's where you show that mountains are being moved. Then I think also being vulnerable—being able to go to a meeting and say, "Guys, I'm really working on growth mindset, but I really feel like I personally am failing here. I need some help."

Having those open discussions encourages more people! We talk about our students feeling safe, but it's the same thing with the staff. The teachers have to feel safe to embark on this because it's uncomfortable at the beginning, and it's a new way of thinking and speaking, and there's a big power shift, right? From the teacher to the kiddos!

That's nerve-wracking at the beginning, right? But it’s such a positive power shift!

Getting administrators in on it too! I really believe that just as people approach things with a growth and fixed mindset, that schools and organizations also have a growth or fixed mindset. A lot of times, you don't have to look further than our handbook to figure out what we’re valuing here.

Are we valuing growth or are we valuing perfection? Getting a good gauge on what is being valued and how: are only kids who are getting on the A honor roll being celebrated? Do we have ways of celebrating kids who are making incremental steps toward growth? Do we celebrate that at all in our culture?

As a teacher, I think you have the opportunity to speak to admins and say, "We need to refocus and celebrate," and like Dave said, "This is evidence; this is research-based!" There’s a strong body of research going back, what, 30 or 40 years that supports this as a valuable learning intervention.

Just sharing that and being an advocate for it in your school, I think, is key to changing the culture of the entire school.

Very good!

The only thing I would add is just that when I’ve talked to teachers who have catalyzed these kinds of cultural transformations of their schools, I think a lot of the time it’s really happened with just a handful of teachers who really started doing it, and they really started modeling it and going and talking to other teachers about it.

It took some time. It wasn't like, "We're all going to do growth mindset all at once!" In my experience, that usually doesn’t work very well. It’s more that you kind of start around this core group of teachers, and then it branches out from there as other teachers see the amazing things that can happen.

Then they start to say, "Hey, maybe that could work in my class! Actually, I’d like to have my kids be that inspired or that motivated."

That's interesting, actually! I’m very curious to know, for Sam, what made you want to try out these growth mindset activities? Like, what was the catalyst for that?

It actually stemmed in the beginning; I noticed that my kiddos were coming without tools. At the time, I was in fifth grade, and I had to send my babies off to middle school. I wanted them as empowered and with as many strategies as they could possibly have before they went because middle school can be really difficult years.

So I started looking at things like their perseverance—how do they speak to one another, how do they advocate for themselves when they need something? We started little by little looking at things like that, and I started really trying to research and find things to support that.

It’s funny: we watched, in the beginning, a really famous quantum theorist who’s melded science and math, and he’s been working on the same equation now for 12 years. I promise my kids I will never make you work on an equation, but if he can do 12 years, we can do 20 minutes, right?

So we started trying to build that stamina, and it just kind of grew from there. It was the perfect timing—you know Annie's book came out, Carol Dweck's book came out, PERTZ is really on the stage now, Learnstorm is out—and it feels like a lot of us were seeking this, right?

If you look at the manifestation of what has really come to the surface, a lot of teachers at the same time really were feeling the same need!

That's beautiful!

All right, I’m glad we can help fill that need; that makes me feel good!

Leanne Morgan from Ontario asks, "Are there words and phrases that foster growth that I can include in my student conversations?" I think actually all of you have touched upon this idea of vocabulary, so let's see if we can try to touch on that.

I'm a firm advocate of the power of "yet." Any time they say any kind of negative talk, I'll point to them: "Yet." Then they have to say it, and then we’re big on our "Now what?" or "Great! What do you need?"

We practice a lot at the beginning of the year, building a toolkit of "Okay, I’m stuck; now what?" All right, I can ask for more time; I can ask to hear it in a different way; I can ask the teacher to rephrase it, or I can ask, you know—we talk about what are the different things I can do to advocate for myself because I might not always be within these four walls when I encounter a problem, and I need to have those intrinsic skills.

So having that vocabulary ready for your kids, and then on the teachers' part, really trying to back away from "Good job!" or "That's right!" Leave it to the class mathematicians: "What do you think this mathematician would propose?"—those launching questions.

In the beginning, they just stare at you like, "Is it right or wrong?" But they start to learn, and it is so powerful!

It is so hard as a teacher when someone throws something wildly incorrect up there, but there’s a lot of grace in that too. When the kids start debating and discussing, we talk about, "Do you have the right to change your mind?"

Then the kid says, "Oh, I’d like to change my answer!" I think there’s so much power in how kids speak to each other and speak to themselves. Then it’s hard for the teacher, but kind of backing up and giving those launching questions—that's crowd control at that point!

Very good! I think just from a growth mindset standpoint, I think the kinds of language we use—the words we use—can be really important. For example, are you referring to things as—are we talking about building skills, like calling out when you're doing something?

"Oh, you're building your skills; you’re becoming a mathematician," or "You're building your writing skills right now!" Or "You're becoming a better writer!" We're really focusing students on those processes and how the fact that they're learning while doing so—it's kind of taking the focus off of the end result and really focusing it on the things that the students can actually control for themselves, which is the process that they're doing.

Really reminding them and debriefing so that they really understand what it is that they’re doing and that all this effort they're doing—it's actually not just going toward a grade; it’s going to them leveling up, them becoming a writer, them becoming a mathematician, a scientist, a better civic thinker—whatever that may be.

They're really developing those skills and really making sure to call out that learning is a process they’re enacting in your class.

Right! So not just work for the sake of work, but work for the sake of growth and betterment!

I love that! All right, so we’re going to wrap up. I'm going to actually throw you a bit of a curveball and ask you a final question with a challenge!

What is one last piece of advice for teachers for fostering growth mindset that you would give this year, if you can give it in ten words or less?

Oh, I know!

All right, I’m going to start with Dave.

"Have a growth mindset about building a growth mindset culture!"

Was that too high? I think I did that right!

Okay! All right, go ahead, Annie! One last piece of advice for teachers!

"Model your growth and fixed mindsets, and normalize mistakes in your classroom!"

Well done! Well done, I like it!

All right, Sam, your last name!

Okay, "Be vulnerable, be a champion for your kids, and model."

I love that! That was very good and all very tweetable! Very great!

So I want to thank Dave and Annie and Sam for joining us today! I learned something, and I hope that you all did too! I want to remind everyone that there's still some time to sign up, so if you haven't signed up, please sign up right now—today! But definitely by the end of October!

And keep on tagging your classroom celebrations with hashtag Learnstorm on Twitter and Facebook. We really love seeing them in the office, so please keep on doing that!

Welcome back to the school year, teachers! Thank you, and goodbye.