Mindset Playground

This article discusses the research of Charan Ranganath (UC Davis) on the brain chemistry of curiosity and the role of dopamine. QUOTE "What Ranganath wants to know most is why some people seem naturally more curious than others. Lots of factors, including stress, aging and certain drugs can affect dopamine processing in the brain, he says."

YOUR BRAIN MAY BE HARD-WIRED TO FOCUS ON THE NEGATIVE, BUT (WITH PRACTICE) YOU CAN REPROGRAM IT: read the article to learn more about these five practical suggestions: 1 take a short break 2 practice looking for small moments of beauty or kindness 3 search for and comment on the positive qualities and actions of others 4 exercise 5 try to be persistent with your mindfulness practices, but don't beat yourself up

This is a collection of Growth Mindset Twitter posts for the week of May 7-14 2016.

In this audio podcast (appx. 10 minutes), Carol Dweck talks about some mistaken approaches people sometimes take with growth mindset ,and she also shares a great strategy for managing your tendencies to get stuck in a fixed mindset.

This is good advice for teachers, and it's also something you can do for yourself as a student: 1. Tell them, over and over and over that 'Brains can get stronger.' 2. Pay attention to effort over results. 3. Catch them being persistent. 4. Be specific with praise. 5. Encourage a healthy attitude to failure and challenge. 6. Use the word 'yet', and use it often. 7. Show them that they don't always have to be successful to be okay. 8. Encourage them to keep the big picture in mind. 9. When they do well without effort … 10. And when they put in the effort but don't do so well … 11. Permission to fail.

QUOTE "You slowly pull back as the kids get better on their own, but not let them flail around so much that they get frustrated and give up."

This is a talk by Carol Dweck about the dangers of perfectionism. It starts with a great anecdote from her childhood: one of her teachers seated the students in IQ order!

QUOTE Perhaps most importantly, the resilient children had what psychologists call an "internal locus of control": they believed that they, and not their circumstances, affected their achievements. The resilient children saw themselves as the orchestrators of their own fates. In fact, on a scale that measured locus of control, they scored more than two standard deviations away from the standardization group.

This is a fabulous of 50 ideas to open your mind and grow your creativity. Pick one and give it a try!

QUOTE The first rule of improvisation is "yes, and," meaning that anyone's contribution to the group discussion is accepted without judgment. "We always talk about the four 'c's of improv: creativity, critical thinking, collaboration and communication," says Deana Criess. To persuade students to abandon their fear of mistakes, she insists on unconditional support to all answers, then works to build trust among the group and invite risk-taking.

This great article asks you to ponder how science really works: instead of accepting the facts as given, we grow by poking and probing. Sometimes exploring the unknown can make us uncomfortable, but by pursuing what is uncertain and unknown, we will be more innovative in our thinking and learning.