This Mindset in Education Professional Enquiry aim was to focus on raising attainment of a small group of pupils by addressing their engagement with their learning.
It was apparent that due to coming out of the first COVID-19 lockdown in August 2020, the new Primary 2 pupils were the most dependent with support requirements, both emotionally and educationally. Developing confidence, understanding that mistakes are good, and valuing perseverance were key skills that we wanted to instil into our pupils.
We decided to approach this by raising awareness of growth mindset in a series of six lessons from ‘Growth Mindset Lessons Every Child is a Learner’ by Katherine Munster with Shelly Clarke. The lessons provide a framework of defining fixed and growth mindsets, identifying feelings relating to failure, linking growth mindset attitudes to learning, and valuing perseverance along with setting personal challenges.
Pre and post questionnaires were created and conducted to assess the small group’s mindset and help to evaluate if the lessons had a change on their perception. Assessment data along with anecdotal observations were also used to see the impact on engagement and progression within literacy. The vision was to establish key learnings from this small-scale project and continue with a whole school rollout, engaging with staff, pupils and parents on identifying growth mindset, along with understanding the positive impact it has on learning.
The fear of failure was prevalent within the class, particularly within the Primary 2 pupils.
There were daily occurrences of pupils not wanting the share answers within teacher input sessions, copying answers, refusal to complete work, along with getting upset and saying they could not do the tasks. It was decided that the Mindset in Education project would focus on the health and wellbeing of understanding and identifying what a growth mindset is and how making good choices help with learning. It was hoped that by tackling the negative behaviour and attitudes to learning by introducing a more positive approach that the pupils had ownership for, would turn the situation around and engagement with their learning would increase and have a desirable impact on attainment levels.
By conducting the growth mindset project, three distinct changes were noticed:
Overall, the project achieved the aims set out as the pupils are more confident about participating with the learning activities, they also have an understanding that learning is hard and with perseverance and hard work, they will get there. However, it is also noted that there is still a lot of work to do to fully embed the growth mindset methodology, as at times it is easily forgotten and reverts back to a negative fixed mindset when the pupils face friendship issues and are feeling tired.
If doing this project again, it would be recommended to communicate to the rest of the school and parents about the project. An assembly with some simple activities to introduce the concepts along with a takeaway message would help to raise awareness of growth mindset and the link to improved learning. Newsletters to the parents would also highlight the aims of the project and help to embed vocabulary and awareness at home. Embedding growth mindset could also be done within class by celebrating clear examples by handing out certificates to individuals who demonstrated growth mindset values within their learning. This would promote to others clearly what actions make up having a growth mindset and that as a class we truly value them because they have a positive impact on our learning.
The timelines set out in the project plan were flexible and realistic enough to be able to stay within.
There was one week allocated to collecting the pre-questionnaire data, six weeks to deliver the growth mindset lessons, and then four weeks to collect the post-questionnaire data. Within the timeline, there were factors that impacted it: timetable change when starting term four, student teacher with classroom teaching responsibilities, and other school and project priorities.
The success for staying within the project timeline were using the pre-made lesson ideas for 5 to 6 year olds from the ‘Growth Mindset Lessons Every Child a Learner’ by Katherine Munster with Shelly Clarke, arranging regular progress update meetings with the Mindset Leader and Mindset Champion, with whom we were doing the project together over two schools, and providing awareness of the project’s progress at the whole school staff meetings. Another success was having a clear timetable established. This really helped when allocating the teaching of lessons with the student teacher when they were building up continuous teaching experience. All the mindset lessons were conducted by the same teacher to give the pupils continuity with recapping on their learning and reflecting on the activities.
Once the project had started, there were very limited changes that needed to happen. This was mainly due to the project using the pre-made lessons from ‘Growth Mindset Lessons Every Child a Learner’ by Katherine Munster with Shelly Clarke. A slight change was made when the timetable changed at the start of term four, when instead of delivering the lesson over one hour session, it was split over two half hour sessions. The pupils were able to re-cap what they had learned from the previous session before moving on with the learning activity.
The growth mindset project raised awareness of identifying fixed and growth mindsets. It has helped the pupils to unpick the different types of language used when having a fixed or growth mindset, as well as the different types of attitudes to learning. By working through the six lessons, the pupils have enjoyed watching the video clips, taking part in the practical activities, and verbalising their views about mindsets. It has been meaningful for the pupils to have their own words put up on the wall displays that summarise their thinking of growth and fixed mindsets. This has helped when facing difficulties with learning attitudes to have a wall display full of pupil voice to use to back up identifying mindsets and strategies to move on with their learning.
The understanding of growth mindset has improved. This can be shown with the example when asked if they like to try things that are hard, there was a noticeable improvement that went from ‘true’ to ‘very true’. This shows that the pupils are happier at tackling activities that are challenging for them. Another change that was noted was that they are less likely to get worried about making a mistake, as this went from ‘true’ down to ‘a bit true’. This shows that giving it a go type of attitude is starting to embed within the subset questioned. Further development with attitudes towards making mistakes have improved from moving from ‘a bit true’ to ‘true’ with stating that they do not mind making mistakes as they recognise that they help them with their learning. The message about persistence has also started to make an effect, as there is a slight change from moving towards ‘not true’ from ‘a bit true’ when thinking about whether they would normally give up when something gets too hard.
Unfortunately, the attainment data with writing shows no change from levels from March 2021 to May 2021. The majority of the focus group pupils have maintained their level of working within the first stage of first level of Curriculum for Excellence either at developing or secure. There was one exception, where one pupil’s attainment data dropped and was assessed against the early level benchmark. This highlights that even with the increased amount of awareness and changes to attitude, more work needs to be done to embed the mindset attitudes.
Observations with engagement with reading activities has improved with participation of all pupils with their guided reading sessions. Persistence with sounding out, breaking up and decoding words has improved, along with turn taking and being supportive of listening to other pupils reading. It has even been commented on during the recent parent teacher interviews held in June 2021, where several parents observed a change in the attitude of their children with their reading and were keen to do reading straight away when getting home from school. The pupils also recognise themselves that they are getting better at identifying their common words and that this is down to hard work and perseverance.
It is hard to truly evaluate the impact the mindset project has had on the school, and this is mainly due to still operating within the COVID-19 restrictions, where the class must form a bubble with itself for learning, eating and playing activities and not mix with any other class. Masks are worn by all adults. Singing has only resumed recently and only confidently started this outside. The sharing of resources has been limited as well as the promotion of play-based learning, which was introduced last academic year and subsequently put on temporary hold whilst teaching within the restrictions. These restrictions have continued to have an impact on the social and emotional needs of the pupils. There have been a significant increase of friendship issues as seen by the frequent use of the class worry box, and seeing the pupils being tired and teary within lessons.
By working through the mindset lessons has given the class the vocabulary to identify and understand different aspects of learning, such as trying again and again, mistakes are learning opportunities, and the importance of challenging themselves. We are at the early stages of embedding growth mindset within the school. The pre and post questionnaire data shows an improvement with identifying mindsets, along with a positive change with attitudes to having a growth mindset.
This is evidenced with if they like to try things that are hard, there was a noticeable improvement of 0.8 gain and highlighted that the pupils enjoyed taking on a challenging activity than at the start of the project. A 1.2 change was noted that the pupils were less likely to get worried about making a mistake and this emphasised a reduction in anxiety with making mistakes. Further development with attitudes towards making mistakes have improved with a 0.8 gain, which shows they are beginning to not mind making mistakes as they recognise that they help them with their learning. The message about persistence has also started to make an effect, as there is a 0.8 change which demonstrates that they would keep trying even when something gets too hard.
Pre intervention Responses
Post Intervention Responses
Overall, there is evidence that the mindset lessons have increased awareness of growth and fixed mindsets. Engagement has increased with reading. Attainment data for writing has shown no real change. Further embedding of growth mindset and celebrating specific examples of when someone has demonstrated a growth mindset may have a more significant impact on measuring a positive increase with attainment through improved engagement levels.
My colleagues are very keen to find out about the impact from the mindset project and whether it would be feasible for them to replicate within their own teaching. High level overviews have been shared within whole school staff meetings. The mindset wall displays have created a lot of interest and further questioning about the pupils take on with identifying fixed and growth mindsets.
One of the school values is self-belief and the growth mindset project fits alongside this value perfectly.
To promote the value of self-belief, the whole school role out would be able to conduct a set of lessons to understand and identify the different types of mindsets and work on practical activities to embed the benefits of growth mindset with learning. Recognising and celebrating examples of growth mindset by issuing certificates with real and specific instances showing, perseverance, learning through mistakes, taking on learning challenges, would benefit the individual pupil as well as embedding and raising expectations of having a growth mindset as part of the school ethos. It would be expected that attainment data would be collected before and after the project, pre and post questionnaires conducted to establish changes to attitudes to mindset, and communications via assemblies and newsletters shared to raise the awareness of the value of having a growth mindset on learning.