Week 15 Growth Mindset: OU and Me

Caption: The library at The University of Oklahoma. Link.

I think that there are definitely some areas in which OU could improve their approach to growth mindset. However, I think that there are some things about colleges that inherently can't be changed and will always go against growth mindset. GPAs are necessary and cannot be abolished altogether, but they encourage students to try and achieve a certain grade instead of to try and learn. I think one way of maybe helping this would be to encourage students to learn from their mistakes. If students do poorly on a test, maybe they can retake the test and write a paper over what they learned to show that they are learning form their mistakes instead of just being punished by them. This way, GPA is still held up but there are more ways to encourage learning from mistakes. It's hard to think of ways that the university as a whole can encourage learning and growth, but I think that professors can encourage this by putting less pressure on students to perform well on tests and put more emphasis on assignments that encourage them to better understand the base topics that they are in the classes for. College seems to inherently not encourage growth mindset because of the emphasis on getting good grades instead of learning the topics. If less emphasis was put on testing, I think that this could be combatted.

Growth Mindset: Growth in Training

Caption: A line of triathletes waiting to swim. Link.

I've recently picked up the sport of triathlons. I did my first ever triathlon back in December and I immediately fell in love with them. I've been training and on April 2, I completed my first Half Iron Man, going a total of 70.3 miles. Training was admittedly very hard and I didn't train quite like I had wanted to for it. I was hoping to have trained a bit harder so I would be more prepared. However, there were many times where I wasn't training for the goal of becoming a better athlete and preparing for my triathlons to come. There were many times where when I was training, I was just trying to finish the workout I had set for myself to do. I wasn't working for a larger goal, I was just thinking about accomplishing the task at hand. I think that I could apply growth mindset to my goal of becoming a better triathlete and preparing for my future triathlons. That way, I don't look at the individual workouts as something to get over with, but as stepping stones to the bigger goal at hand.

Week 8 Growth Mindset

Caption: A motivational message written in scrabble pieces. https://pixabay.com/en/photos/motivation/ .

I think that I'm particularly good at finding motivation inside myself and applying that to the things that I do. I'm a very driven person and I have no problem finding the motivation to do things. I think I'm also very good at pushing myself, not just in my studies, but in life, too. I've always been a dreamer and tend to often come up with big things I want to do. However, because of my good motivations, I'm usually pretty good at achieving the things I strive for too. One thing I think I could definitely improve on is taking more risks, particularly in school and in this class. When it comes to my storytelling, I tend to stick with what I know I do best. I write in the same style every time and I never switch my storytelling perspective. One thing I am not very good at also is asking a lot of questions. I tend to take feedback well, but am bad about asking for it from people.

Growth Mindset

Caption: An artistic representation of Growth Mindset by Jessica Ottewell. (https://www.flickr.com/photos/134717758@N06/19751739181)

Though I had never specifically heard of Growth Mindset, I've heard of this way of thinking before to some extent. This is my first time ever hearing of Carol Dweck and her "Growth Mindset" specifically. I think this was an interesting read for me because I think that I have been that student that is easily rewarded by doing well on tests and getting A's in school. I've never been taught to appreciate working hard for the sake of working hard. I don't know that I'll necessarily be excited to learn more about growth mindset, but I do think it would be interesting to approach some of my classwork with this mindset instead. I'm not particularly worried about any one class this semester; rather, I'm worried about the combination of all of my classes and the stress that will most likely accompany them.