The Problem: Having a Destructive Mindset
Let’s say your child was just handed back their test results — they failed! How does your child respond?
A) “I’m no good at math.”
B) “I’m going to get it right next time!”
C) “This is really hard and I’m not a math person. I’ll just give up.”
D) “This is really hard, but I’m going to think outside the box and keep going!”
“I hate math . . . “
If you selected choices A or C, your child probably dislikes math. They may find math monotonous, rigid, incomprehensible, or even a bit scary and avoid additional energy expenditures beyond pretending to take notes in class and sloppily turning in homework.
Your child hates math because they’re bad at it, right?
Well, think of an activity your child loves (say, volleyball). They may make mistakes, but that doesn’t stop them from pushing harder. In fact, mistakes motivate them to get even better! Your child has what is called a “Growth Mindset” towards volleyball. They’re progress-driven, rather than results-driven and believes they can keep making progress if they work hard enough.
“. . . because I’m not a math person.”
Your child doesn’t hate math because they simply aren’t good at it, but because they believe themselves to be incapable of getting better at it! Your child has a “Fixed Mindset” towards math. They believe they are either good at math or not, or that they can get better with hard work but can’t change their basic level of “math intelligence”. Since their intelligence is fixed, so is their progress!
It’s a self fulfilling prophecy.
Your child believes they can’t progress, and so they don’t get any better. One study confirms this. The grades of middle school students with a Fixed Mindset (represented by a thick black line) plateaued and even began to decrease as they approached high school math [1].
But what causes this destructive mindset to form in the first place? Your child may have been programmed into having destructive thoughts from negative experiences (i.e. failing a math test), stigmas such as taking longer to solve problems than the other kids, and poorly guided phrases.
Tutoring Strategy: Mindset Reset
I help students build a “Growth Mindset” or belief that math intelligence continually increases with hard work. The science agrees. In the same graph (above), students with a Growth Mindset made consistent increases in their grades — even as they progressed to more advanced math courses! No matter how many mistakes are made, they keep going until they succeed.
I help students . . .
➜ Try harder and longer, because trying harder doesn’t mean they’re not smart.
➜ Get comfortable with not knowing easily or right away.
➜ See mistakes as opportunities to get better.
➜ Persist and don’t give up when something’s hard.
Your child needs someone who believes in them and can help them believe in themselves too!
I help students find their internal motivation
If you believe you can learn it, why learn math? What do you want to do in life? Go to college? Start a business? MOTIVATION. I will help your child solidify the reason they want get get high A’s in math.
I encourage students to take their time
Learning is NOT linear.
Being good at math does NOT mean being fast at math.
Mathematicians, who we could think of as the world’s top math people are some of the slowest math thinkers I have met. This is Laurent Schwartz. He won the Fields Medal which is the top math prize. It’s like winning an Oscar in math. He struggled in school because his school valued speed, and he was one of the slowest math thinkers
in his class.
“I was always deeply uncertain about my own intellectual capacity. I thought I was intelligent. And it is true that I was, and still am, rather slow. I need time to seize things because I always need to understand them fully.” rapidity doesnt have a precise relation to intelligence. What IS IMPORTANT IS TO DEEPLY UNDERSTAND THINGS AND THEIR RELATONS TO EACH OTHER.
Not fast math thinkers, deep math thinkers. We need these thinkers in society!
I encourage students to persevere
Think of someone you look up to. What was their journey to success like? Thomas Edison was told by his teachers that he was too stupid to learn anything! Referred to his 1000 mistakes to create the lightbulb as 1000 steps. Albert Einstein was thought of as slow. Michael Jordan, Lady Gaga, . . .
Successful vs. unsuccessful business people try seemingly wild ideas, feel comfortable being wrong, are open to different experiences, play with ideas without judging them, push through challenges, and are willing to go against traditional ideas.
When you make a mistake, you’re brain grows. Synapse fire. (it doesn’t feel pleasant because it is like a mental pushup) Conversely, when you get work right no brain growth happens. Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration. When you make a mistake you don’t need to get the right answer, you just need to struggle and think about the mistake, for synapses to fire. It’s important in math class to work on hard problems to struggle and even make mistakes. The most successful students are not those who don’t mess up, they are the ones who mess up and learn from it and continue on.
I give students growth-oriented feedback
Students who were praised for being hardworking took on the harder math problem, students who were praised for being “smart” took on an easier one [1]. Parents who told their children “I wasn’t good at math either, so don’t worry” saw their children’s grades plumett in the same term [2]. Students who teachers had attached “I believe in you” on their essays achieved significantly higher levels at the year [3].
What do these three studies have in common? Verbal feedback.
When your child knows that an expert (such as a teacher or tutor) believes in them and expects high things from them, they tend to do better. Students need someone who will believe in them and, more importantly, they need to learn how to believe in themselves.