Month: August 2021

Madi Robito

LIL 120

Core Handbook Questions

Write 4-5 sentences drawing a connection/relationship between something specific in the Core Handbook and your Fall classes, between the goals/values expressed and your own goals. 

The core handbook had touched upon each of the four themes for the core curriculum. The first one being environmental awareness – I’m currently in Env 104 which would fall under this category. This category examines the relationship between humans and their environment- which reminded me of an activity I did in Env 104 this morning. We had to make a decision whether to redraw boundaries and build on conservation land that holds endangered flowers, or to make the effort to save the flowers and not develop. This really made me think about how I’m living in an ecosystem with other creatures and wildlife that I need to think of. Today was only the second time I had this class and I already have a very changed opinion and perspective on it. After the first class I was feeling that I would be bored and uninterested in this class but after today I realized that this is a very important class to take. I have a changed view and a new mindset going into the rest of the semester with this class. It’s important to learn about your surroundings and that we all live in an environment/world that is sacred and deserving of our respect. 

Identify at least 2 questions about the Core

• I’m currently in Lifespan this semester and I took it as an exploration course. In section VII it talks about the Social Science Exploration Classes, and PSY is a prefix for one of them, which is what my Lifespan class is. So my question is this would count as my social science exploration course correct?  
• This may be a dumb question, and I think it was answered in the handbook, but, does each college have a different handbook? For example, my roommate who is in nursing, would she have to take an Environmental Issues class? 

Madi Robito

Growth Mindset vs Fixed Mindset – Carol Dweck’s Ted Talk

1. There are very key differences between the two terms, growth mindset and fixed mindset. A growth mindset is having the ability to push through challenges and take them as they come with no fear of failure. Taking criticism and overcoming obstacles that may be in one’s way with a positive mindset. People with a growth mindset have the desire to learn new things and with this mindset they build on their skills and knowledge. Carol Dweck on describing the children with a growth mindset : “…the ability that ideas can be developed. They engage deeply. Their brain is on fire with yet. They engage deeply. They process the error. They learn from it and they correct it.” People that have more of a fixed mindset see things and process things a little differently. They take failure and don’t overcome it, they subject themselves to it. Giving up is a part of their nature and they don’t understand that failure is a part of growth. They never grow their abilities because they aren’t allowing themselves the room or opportunity to grow. People with a fixed mindset want to make themselves look smarter or better and may even feel threatened by the people around them with growth mindsets. Carol Dweck speaks on this about fixed mindset children: “From their more fixed mindset perspective, their intelligence had been up for judgement, and they failed. Instead of luxuriating in the power of yet, they were gripped in the tyranny of now.” 
2. Carol Dweck offers ways on how to stimulate a growth mindset, they are as follows:
   1. “First of all, we can praise wisely, not praising intelligence or talent. That has failed. Don’t do that anymore. But praising the process that kids engage in, their effort, their strategies, their focus, their perseverance, their improvement. This process of praise creates kids who are hardy and resilient.” 
      1. Responding to this I can agree with this statement and I love this point of view. I relate to this in the area of school and even in sports. Being praised for talent is not good, I would rather be praised for how I am improving or how hard I’m focusing on getting better. That is how to create a better player on and off the field. 
   2. The second way Dweck mentions: “We recently teamed up with game scientists from the University of Washington to create a new online math game that rewarded yet. In this game, students were rewarded for effort, strategy, and progress. The usual math game rewards you for getting answers right, right now, but this game rewarded the process. And we got more effort, more strategies, more engagement over longer periods of time, and more perseverance when they hit really, really hard problems. 
      1. Responding to this, I love this idea. I have always been a person who struggles with math and I would get assignments where I needed to get questions right to move forward. The amount of times I would get so frustrated and want to give up was countless. I love this idea of rewarding the effort. I would have given more effort and more of my time into something like this because I wouldn’t have gotten as discouraged, and the positiveness would have allowed me to keep pushing forward. 
   3. I like both of these ways of bridging the gap and I believe that this is a great way to shift children or anyone from having a fixed mindset to a growth mindset. 
3.  Dweck’s mindset on intelligence is different from how I see it, or at least, how I used to see it. She see’s intelligence as something that you can adopt, like a skill or a mindset. Dweck offers the thought at the time 8:16 that “Before, effort and difficulty made them feel dumb, made them feel like giving up, but now, effort and difficulty, that’s when their nuerons are making new connections, stronger connections. That’s when they’re getting smarter.”  So she sees intelligence as something that you can completely change and learn – something that you can adopt. I used to see intelligence as something that you were more born with. You had different skills and maybe you were smarter than the kids in  your class – a different level. Though, that doesn’t mean I didn’t believe these skills can be enhanced with effort. This is how Dweck see’s it. The growth mindset, that skills and intelligence can be improved with effort and the level of difficulty. 
4. I have definitely had many times in my life where I have had a fixed mindset about something. I recently took biochem in my senior year of high school. This kind of science is not my strong suit and I set myself up for failure by telling myself “I can’t do this.” I worked myself up so much over the first test that I didn’t allow my brain to retain the information and learn it. I blocked my brain off from growth and learning new information, I didn’t do well on the test and this really discouraged me. Looking back I wish I could have allowed myself to push through this static mindset and opened myself up to the challenge, facing it head on so I would’ve done better. My scenario relates to a study mentioned by Dweck in 1:51, “…In one study they told us that they would probably cheat the next time instead of studying more if they failed a test. In another study, after a failure, they looked for someone who did worse than they did so they could feel really good about themselves.” This is how I felt after failing my test, and I did indeed feel better when my best friend did worse. This isn’t right and I fixed this mindset through the school year and I studied hard. I ended up passing the class with a 92 average and I’m proud of myself for switching my mindset.