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IS SUCCESS ABOUT LEARNING-OR PROVING YOU'RE SMART? Benjamin Barber, an eminent political theorist, once said, "I don't divide the world into the weak and the strong, or the successes and the failures. I divide the world into the learners and nonlearners"
What on earth would make someone a nonlearner? Everyone is bom with an intense drive to learn Infants stretch their skills daily. Not just ordinary skills, but the most difficult tasks of a lifetime, like learning to walk and talk. They never decide it's too hard or not worth the effort Babies don't worry about making mistakes or humiliating themselves. They walk, they fall, they get up. They just barge forward
What could put an end to this exuberant learning? The fixed mindset As soon as children become able to evaluate themselves, some of them become afraid of challenges. They become afraid of not being smart 1 have studied thousands of people from preschoolers on, and it's breathtaking how many reject an opportunity to learn.
We offered four-year-olds a choice. They could redo an easy jigsaw puzzle or they could try a harder one. Even at this tender age, children with the fixed mindset-the ones who believed in fixed traits-stuck with the safe one. Kids who are bom smart "don't do mistakes," they told us.
Children with the growth mindset-the ones who believed you could get smarter-thought it was a strange choice. Why are you asking me this lady? Why would anyone want to keep doing the same puzzle over and over? They chose one hard one after another I'm dying to figure them out!" exclaimed one little girl.
So children with the fixed mindset want to make sure they succeed. Smart people should always succeed. But for children with the growth
Mindset, success is about stretching themselves It's about becoming smarter
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