When I was at University, a running joke was how little we’d all worked on our papers, how late and last minute we’d left them, and how little effort we’d put into them. A couple of things jolted me out of this mindset. International students I knew, from China, India, Europe, Africa and South America, didn’t seem to share English students’ view that slack effort was funny and clever. And my Dad told me that what actually happened at his University was that people boasted publicly about not working, but then worked feverishly in private. The joke was on us.
Beliefs matter; mindset matters; work ethic matters. Kids’ ideas about effort stem from their mindset. The research from Carol Dweck is much acclaimed, and rightly so. If you believe in effortless intelligence, it leads to fear of effort and failure. If you believe in hard work and overcoming setbacks…
View original post 1,036 more words
The Echo Chamber 