Thanks for that perspective, aeh.
In addition to val's post above, I think that something which bothers
me about the Dweckian perspective on "growth" mindset as a construct is that I see this tying into the larger societal ill of frenzied push-parenting.
Now parents who post here regularly over a course of months or years, we're NOT most parents, and our kids (rather by definition) are
not most children.
The kinds of settings, opportunities, etc. that we provide our HG/+ children allow them to soar. But there are other parents just as determined to provide those opportunities for their children*
so that they can BECOME* "highly gifted" or something even more illustrious.* regardless of the feelings, impulses, or desire of the children in question, that is.
It's not much of a stretch to assert that this fuels the greater social ill of college admissions frenzy. I don't see much difference between that and SAT tutors and superscoring and Summer AP prep-school, and community-service-as-resume-fodder, etc.
Maybe it's just me, but it seems all of a piece, this notion that push parenting actually pushes on some
inherently quite MUTABLE property.
I'm not very confident that it does, in point of fact. Actually-- I rather suspect that it just harms the children who aren't born to be HG+, and makes them feel a lot like their parents can't accept who they actually are as human beings in their own right.
So yeah. Growth mindset? Hmmm. Maybe a useful construct for some things, but maybe not so much for others, and maybe the way that this is being presented is actually fueling something that every parent ought to be more or less appalled by to begin with.
I'm not a fan of "multiple intelligences" either, probably no surprise.
I say all of that and I don't-- inherently-- have much of a problem with loving push-parenting in it's less high-pressure form. I do think that children need guidance about their life decisions, education included. But what I do not believe that they "need" is tinkering with their basic intrinsic motivation to learn in a misguided attempt to make them all SuperKids. That seems somewhat abusive to me on some level. Like me pushing my DD to swim well enough to make nationals or something-- maybe I
could do it, with the help of some pros that would push her alongside me... but it would. be. wrong.
This kind of nuanced view, however, is never going to make me one of Jon's Persons of Major Significance, I fear. Perhaps I just need to wish it so using a growth mindset.
