How to Teach a Growth Mindset to Children (and to yourself)

Introduction: The Importance of a Growth Mindset

I think it's pretty universally accepted that we all want the best for our kids. Whether or not you even have some, the future generation is important.

They will be the ones who run the world after all, .

, and it's of course easy for us to get caught up with like, oh, kids of today are bad at this, or silly with that, but we can be doing something about it.

A question I've had a few times lately is how do you teach kids a growth mindset?

and I think this is one of the most important questions that we can be taking on as a society.

The Challenge of Instant Gratification

As you've probably noticed, things do tend to be trending towards instant gratification.

Things like social media that can instantly occupy you. Getting food from Uber Eats.

People don't have time to read books anymore. They're more likely to be reading a tweet or just a TikTok, et cetera. . And instant gratification is the antithesis of growth mindset, where you embrace difficulty

And then there's the concept of destiny. Often we teach kids that destiny is controlled by an exam grade or a job title, and that of course isn't correct. You can go on to do many incredible things based on your own intuition and ability to just

deal with problems, and have a vision for what you want from your life. And so I think talking about growth mindset and how we teach it to others around us and how we embody it ourselves , is gonna give us a lot to learn in this episode. So hello and welcome to the Growth Mindset Psychology Podcast with me, Sam Webster Harris.

As always talking about the science of self-improvement and the philosophy of a life well lived,

the ability to nurture a growth mindset within us and those around us, I think is a huge part of how much you can enjoy your life and be happy.

So on that we are going to be talking all about growth mindset, why it matters for different people,

How to embody it. Practical applications, creating an environment for it. And the common traps that people normally fall into when they think about growth mindset, which there are certainly plenty of. Right. It's gonna be a good episode.

Say stay with us.

Defining Growth Mindset

When you want to teach something, it makes sense to start with understanding what it is. So we'll start back at the basics with what is a growth mindset really. Well, the first definition is that a growth mindset? Is the belief that ability can grow through effort as opposed to a fixed mindset

where you believe that your abilities are fixed and can't be changed, you are just good at math or you're bad at math, and that's your life.

The thing is that a growth mindset is just technically true. Anyone who thinks they're bad at art will find their first drawing is useless. But if you give up, you will always be useless at art. If you do correctly believe that a growth mindset exists and you fill a sketchbook with drawings, undoubtedly you will improve.

The Power of Embracing Challenges

The thing is you have to lean into the challenge, and that's the other part of growth mindset, which is enjoying the challenge and understanding that it will make you better. Carol Dweck noted that when she studied children, the ones with a growth mindset would get bored if they were given puzzles that were too easy for them and they'd go and find harder ones, purely outta self-interest.

So besides the general understanding that the obstacle is the way, and that when things get difficult, it's going to be rewarding.

Growth Mindset vs. Fixed Mindset

Growth mindset, I think also really helps with the concept of change in our lives.

Fixed mindset often reject, change, and holds onto the status quo with things as they are. Whereas a growth mindset means that you'll be open to pursue change and improvement, and you can see the world as a place of possibility where you probably can do anything.

It's just a question of how much time and work you put into it. Now, when you see the world through this lens, you have a more , abundant view of possibility as opposed to thinking that the chips are all already cast

This ends up with a result that you can enjoy life and the ups and downs of it and go with the flow

as opposed to fighting it and often getting caught up in your problems.

Teaching Growth Mindset to Children

So to summarize, growth mindset is obviously very important, , which then leads us to ask, why does it really matter for children? ,

well, when you embody all these things I've just spoken about, that affects your resilience, your ability to learn, your self-esteem and your long-term success, at which point you might be like, oh my God, this is so important, .

It might almost feel a little overwhelming , that you have to teach your kid a growth mindset , and beat them if they don't do it properly cause if they don't do it, they're going to be a failure for their rest of their life.

And don't worry, , I hope I haven't stressed you out by making it sound too important. It is of course very important, but it's also important to come across more relaxed . And to go with the flow yourself , and work naturally with a child as opposed to just forcing them directly. Growth mindset. Growth mindset. .

If you remember around what our goals are, . We want the kids of the world to bounce back from a failed test and be open to trying new sports or skills without a fear of looking bad. And if we worry too much about how they embody a growth mindset too directly, we can actually come across quite a fixed mindset when you're always like, oh, you're doing that wrong.

Do this better. , you have to be quite organic and soft with the whole approach to it.

and accepting of failures.

One of the reasons that growth mindset matters so much for children is that they have so many new things coming at them. the key here is that they have to be able to embrace the changes and especially if we think about the future where it's pretty chaotic, we don't even know.

Half jobs that currently exist will even still exist by the time our kids are even being employed.

So the idea of telling them too strictly of what is right or wrong, straight up is probably not the best idea. We more want to just talk about possibility.

studies have shown that when kids are given a grade that doesn't pass, they're given a, not yet. they're much more likely to try harder the next time as opposed to just giving an F. That shows them a failure.

How do we embody and teach a growth mindset

Which leads us into the topic of how do we actually embody and teach a growth mindset, and why isn't it enough to just tell children what is a growth mindset?

a common example I do like to give is that you just can't learn to ride a bike or swim through being told how it works.

Like the physics of riding a bike is all very fascinating and wonderful and you'll still fall off the bike when you get on it. , regardless of whether you be given one hour or a thousand hours of being told how to do it, you just have to get on and fail a lot and learn within your body.

And part of doing that is learning the confidence that failing doesn't mean that you are,destined to always be bad at riding a.

So, instead of teaching explicitly what a growth mindset is, what's more important is the say versus do gap in our own behaviors. Because kids will notice how adults react to failure much more than the words they say about how to do something.

You know, they're saying that people will forget the things you say, but they'll remember how you make them feel. . And that's exactly it here. You don't tell people what a growth mindset is. You make them feel it.

When something goes wrong in your life and you have a failure, like you burn the dinner, whatever, do you blame external events or do you blame yourself and say you're just bad at cooking? Or do you talk about what you could have done better? And show up next week having cooked something much better.

there's a clear difference between what that teaches your child, right?

And so we really have to think about what does it look like when parents, teachers, and the people around us embody a growth mindset. It's really all about how you handle your own mistakes, your frustrations,

and transparently show those moments of learning in front of them instead of hiding your own mistakes.

You should be really fascinated to get feedback even from your own children

or adults around you.

You should be interested in sources of learning and improvement. Could be listening to podcasts, watching a YouTube video of something you're not very good at.

Maybe taking a public speaking course if you want to get better at speaking in front of people like the classics are all fine to follow, ,

Practical Tips for Embodying Growth Mindset

And besides making mistakes, there's also just how do you approach life? Do you think that there's only one way of doing things and that an answer is just what you're told or. Do you naturally come across curious in quizzical ,

and don't think that the world is some pre-packaged thing. That's exactly as it was and will always be as it is.

Or if something interests you, would you actually find out why it is? can you ask Why a pack of make chicken nuggets cost, what they cost And why those costs might change. totally random example.

Why does your car need to get serviced every X amount of miles?

Who makes up all the rules that exist in your life that people normally accept. When you can question why everything is the way it is, there's lots of space to change. Things that are the way they are.

Like, of course gravity exists in the rules of physics, but otherwise, you wanna be able to teach first principles and that nothing's stopping anything from being changed other than people's ability to think about how to change it.

A really nice one here is actually letting kids draw on their walls, uh, and then repainting them and things like that, where often your house is just such a fixed place, uh, that it's kind of cool to show that you can just do renovation work or remold the very fabric of your normal existence.

And maybe don't do it too early so that you don't want kids, um, drawing all over other people's walls, et cetera. But having places that are safe to experiment and not just have to be rules based,

I think is really important. , if you want to learn how to break the mold of what everyone says is how things should or shouldn't be done.

Responding to Mistakes

Um, I think it's worth looking more into how we respond to mistakes, this could be your mistakes or their mistakes and doing it in a growth minded way. You really wanna avoid shame and instead be using curiosity, effort and think about strategies as a way to focus your efforts. So let's say something goes wrong at work.

Do you spend your time complaining about your boss and their decision, or maybe the team you relied on that got in the way or messed up the communication? Or let's say it is clearly your fault, do you then just blame your innate ability by saying like, oh, well I am just bad at math, I'm bad at writing, so I wasn't gonna be able to do a good job of that anyway.

If you get lost, you say like, oh, I'm just terrible at directions. Would you use some more empowering language? Like , I didn't focus correctly on the map. I hadn't paid the correct attention to where we were turning, and I became confused. If I'd researched more earlier, I could have done a better job of it if I did some practice on navigation, I would get better at this. It would show that you have a growth mindset as opposed to just accepting that you're bad at these things or that when things go wrong, it's other people's fault.

It's a clear ability to take responsibility for outcomes, which means that you can improve your outcomes.

And so let's say they do something wrong, that you want to teach them differently. If you say that like, oh, you are bad for doing that, you are silly. You are lazy, et cetera, like those would be judgements of their personality and character and their abilities,

whereas instead, they could have a behavior that is silly or lazy and that still leaves the door open for possibility that they could do a different behavior that isn't silly or lazy. Instead of saying, you're bad at that, you can say, well, you didn't work hard enough and like,

maybe it's gonna be more of a challenge for you and you have to put in more effort, but you have to show that it's completely possible that they can, of course, do the thing.

The Impact of Praise and Rewards

We see the exact same thing when we want to talk about praise and rewarding things that have gone well .

In a correct way that builds a growth mindset as opposed to a fixed mindset. Because if we just say, oh, you're smart, et cetera, that can build more of a fixed mindset. Like honestly, when I was younger, I did think exams were more a test of intelligence and I was told that I was good at maths and physics, et cetera, and I just did really well at them without trying,

which was lovely until I got to the point, till I started to get older where actually revision did make a big difference and suddenly my grades started to slip because if I had just sort of had more of a fixed mindset approach , to dealing with something I just thought I was innately good at.

But what's interesting is that I also was terrible at English and speaking. And they've been told I was terrible at that and I didn't get better at those until I started learning to work on the things that I thought I was good at to improve those and realize that, oh, I can improve at any of my exams.

And so I began improving at all the things I was also told that I was useless at by my teachers, and that was very empowering.

How do we create an environment for growth mindset?

Okay, so besides language and praise, et cetera, how do we otherwise create just an environment that normalizes failure as part of learning? It perhaps embodies more of a growth mindset by default.

So we can think about things like games that we play, storytelling, role models, having rituals for our mistakes.

, so for example, I did a lot of hiking and mountain climbing, and one thing that we got taught was that failure to get to the top is actually fine. And that's part of being a good hiker if it means that you stay alive as opposed to getting caught in bad weather or getting lost, et cetera.

so you're actually quite ready to accept failure on the obvious goal of getting to the top if it means that you're actually a good person and you can come back and have a better attempt the second time. , and I think it's quite rewarding to have those days where everything goes wrong, but it can be called a success If you accept failure and do a better job the next time.

So getting out into nature. I think there's lots of examples like that in other sports. And then otherwise, more practical, easy things to do just in your own home is like playing strategy games where often you may make a wrong decision,

but you can still win the game or try again and learn from your mistakes. And you'll find, of course, , the more different strategy games you play, you get better through the process now. I know a lot of people are teaching their kids chess these days, which is perfectly fine, but any form of game that you can play as a group is also really nice.

Then if you think about the conversations that you have, it's also nice to ask who your kids admire or also talk about who you admire and why. this opens up to some more philosophy what did they consider metrics of success

versus thinking about who someone is just as a person and how they present and live their life and enjoy themselves. Because again, a lot of us can sort of grow up appreciating these metrics of success. Like cars, money, number of views on TikTok, et cetera, versus how happy someone is and how easy they just go with the flow and are kind and appreciative of the people around them , and how they make other people feel.

And you don't have to say exactly like you are wrong, because if you think this TikTok is cool, you can just open-mindedly question them. Like, okay, why do they appreciate , this figure that they're looking at? And what do they actually want to embody in their life? And that's a really.

Useful conversation to kind of just have regularly From different angles.

so like after you finish a TV show, you can talk about who was your favorite character and why?

You can talk about who their favorite teachers are at school,

and essentially as they interact with different figures and people in their life, you can help them think about how they show up themself and who they want to be in life. I think that's a really nice opportunity for fun conversation.

,

Talk about mistakes

Uh, another good conversation to have regularly is also just talking about mistakes that happened that day or week.

you can start it yourself about the own mistakes that you've been making and. Without trying to force it too much on them to just talk about specific mistake you want, just being open-minded about what kinds of mistakes they may have made recently, or what they think they could have been doing better.

Which is a chance to help them reframe that as a way that they can do better as opposed to just being like, oh, I'm bad at this.

And after all that is the whole goal. Right.

Okay. So I think we've learned quite a few things.

Common Pitfalls in Teaching Growth Mindset

So what are the common traps that adults fall into when trying to teach a growth mindset? Well, besides the ones I've already mentioned, like just talking about what a growth mindset is rather than embodying it, things like overpraising , which Sure.

There's the obvious, like just saying that you're good at it, but also doing too much of the reward yourself. Like every time they do something slightly good, that is growth mindset behavior. You are the one that provides the reward that then takes away their ability to reward themself for just doing the good job.

You want some intrinsic motivation to be built as opposed to everything to be extrinsically motivated. Otherwise you are doing the work for them.

One study has shown that when you financially reward children for doing something that they already enjoy, they start to enjoy the thing less. So let's say they like music and they practice the piano. If you start giving them a right here's $10 for every hour of piano practice they do . quickly, it starts to feel like more of a chore for them and it makes it do them less

I think the same thing can happen with just too much praise in general., I'm not saying don't praise your kid. Of course.

, I'm just saying that constant overpraising can be bad.

The Importance of Consistency

To caveat, just to make this even more complicated, another bad thing is being inconsistent. So like sometimes praising them, like showering them at praise and then sometimes like just ignoring them and being like, yeah, whatever.

, and especially bad if it's like, okay, they did well in a test.

So you shout them with praise and then they do badly and you're just like, ugh. Ignore them when ultimately they want just love and acceptance from you regardless of what they do. , and you're there to guide them of what is a sensible behavior, but also to show them that you love them regardless. Around their failures,

being inconsistent with them as a presence in their life .

Can really alter their feelings of safety , and ability to feel comfortable with failure. Because if they're scared of failing or doing something wrong, they'll just avoid anything they'll think they'll be bad at. And that really amplifies a fixed mindset as opposed to teaching them how to embrace and do hard things.

Remember, if you start demanding perfection , whilst you're also preaching that you have to learn from failure, like it's never gonna work. those two ideas that are complete odds with each other,

you have to be embracing failure yourself in your life and embracing their own failures and accepting them for that which. It isn't easy and why it's very hard to teach a growth mindset, but it's one of the most important things that you have to remember and not get wrong.

Do you raelly have a growth mindset?

the other hard thing about growth mindset, I think is that. Everyone thinks they have a growth mindset and it's, it's like driving. Everyone thinks they're in the top 10% of drivers yet statistically, obviously they aren't. And the thing is, when you are not exhibiting a growth mindset, you don't realize you have reasons for all your behaviors a lot of them are just lying to yourself and self protection around, okay, I'm. oh, I'm not good at math. I can't do these things. Like, it's just a way of you to feel comfortable in yourself as opposed to admitting that you're making a mistake and you could try harder, which will probably be difficult, but will be worth doing.

If you blame people around you for your failures, that's of course not your fault. So obviously you're meant to be blaming them and you don't realize that actually you don't have a growth mindset and you could be blaming yourself.

Self-Reflection and Feedback

So you have to really be leaning into feedback and ideally with a partner or people around you , have a system to get honest feedback where you will accept what people say to you.

If they say that, Hey, you could be doing that better, and you don't feel like you're being rejected.

And that actually there is something to learn about in your behaviors that you could do better with. Also, just journaling, thinking about what your goals were and how you thought you would show up, and what you would do versus what you actually did, and just generally having more mantras around possibility and embracing failure

as opposed to the sort of mantras where you say like,

I deserve this just because I'm alive, et cetera.

No, I'm not saying it's easy, but you know, things like regularly listening to a podcast about growth mindset might help

or just honestly asking yourself what are your main challenges?

Maybe it's health and exercise. Maybe it's a skill that's holding you back at work.

Maybe it's how you respond to feedback. You just really need to look into the things that you think you could be doing better and actually start taking them on.

You might even want to see a therapist, like, I've had a few friends lately that I've spoken to whose parents. Have started going to therapy recently and they've noticed such a change in how their parents talk to them and are open to the kinds of decisions that their children are making.

I would honestly explore that if you haven't thought about it before. I know this isn't an advert for better help or anything, I'm just trying to list out the different ideas that you should be aware of.

And on that, I think I have listed most of them.

The Value of Travel and Exposure to Different Cultures

I think the last one I'd like to talk about is probably just travel and taking opportunities to see outside of their world, if you've been to a lot of different cultures. I think it becomes so obvious that the way we live is just made up and it a bunch of decisions in our own zone of culture ,

and it really opens you up to the possibility that there are different ways of doing things and it's very much a decision within yourself, . Which again, I just find really pushes you towards a growth mindset lens rather than everything has to be the way it is.

So that's probably my last tip really which besides the financial side of it, is probably like the easiest one to do because you can't make many mistakes is like, just go to a different culture. Like you're there. Like,

it's not that hard to just show people these things.

It doesn't all have to be family holidays. There's maybe different trips that the school goes on that are great for kids and perhaps before they get to university, like I personally am more in favor of having a gap year and exploring the world.

And I think it can help you make. Better decisions when you go to university, when you've seen more of the world , you've had a chance to see what your interests are rather than blindly going from exams, exams, exams, career decisions straight away because , yeah, I think it's a hard decision to make at 19 years old when you haven't seen much of the world.

Final Tips and Encouragement

I think the final question is

what is one very small shift that you can do as an adult today that your kids would notice immediately? I think the easiest one to do straightaway, just share a mistake that you made recently and what you learned from it. if you go and do that after this podcast.

That will help. You can do it straight away. That's my tip to you.

Cool.

Conclusion and Call to Action

hopefully you've learned a bit more about embodying and living a growth mindset yourself, as well as imparting that to those around you and of course if you're lucky to have them, then the kids around you as well.

A good way to impart some of this wisdom onto these people would also be sharing this episode with those people, which is how we grow. And of course, following subscribing and rating the show would be very handy as well. And, , might help you come back and listen to more growth mindset.

Infuse content with me.

Okay, if you weren't aware, I do have slots open on Wednesday afternoons for free that anyone can have a quick chat with me about something they're thinking about. The link is in the description and I do have a new show about how to change the world and how society and culture was completely constructed,

which I also think is actually quite a good way of teaching a growth mindset and learning how humanity built humanity in the way we are because it really helps you question why things are the way they are. And it's got quite a lot of stories in it, so I think it's actually quite listenable for kids, perhaps even more so than this show.

Um, so yes. I do have another show I would love if you want to follow how to Change the world , and the competition to get free Coaching with me is ending this month and you just have to email me to say that you've started listening to my new show and you're in the competition. That's it.

Okay on that. Remember that life is too short to put all your happiness, behind a bunch of goals and things that you haven't yet done.

It is about living with joy today and being grateful for all the things around you.

So don't put it off. There is no time to waste .

Thank you so much for listening. Go you. Your consistency to reach the end of an episode is legendary, my hero. If you have any ideas or feedback for the show, I'm always interested to hear from you. You're the best studies show. We need time for information to sink in, so I'm going to give you a five second pause, silence to reflect on one idea from the show before you jump back into your busy life.

Ready and go.