How to be [smart, charming, fit, thin, happy...]
Put in the effort. “An overemphasis on intellect or talent — and the implication that such traits are innate and fixed — leaves people vulnerable to failure, fearful of challenges and unmotivated to learn.” That, in a sentence, is Scientific American‘s excellent The Secret to Raising Smart Kids. It’s really some of the best life advice you can get (intelligence is just a nice case example).
The result plays out in children like Jonathan, who coast through the early grades under the dangerous notion that no-effort academic achievement defines them as smart or gifted. Such children hold an implicit belief that intelligence is innate and fixed, making striving to learn seem far less important than being (or looking) smart. This belief also makes them see challenges, mistakes and even the need to exert effort as threats to their ego rather than as opportunities to improve. And it causes them to lose confidence and motivation when the work is no longer easy for them.
Praising children’s innate abilities, as Jonathan’s parents did, reinforces this mind-set, which can also prevent young athletes or people in the workforce and even marriages from living up to their potential. On the other hand, our studies show that teaching people to have a “growth mind-set,” which encourages a focus on effort rather than on intelligence or talent, helps make them into high achievers in school and in life.
In the growth mind-set classes, students read and discussed an article entitled “You Can Grow Your Brain.” They were taught that the brain is like a muscle that gets stronger with use and that learning prompts neurons in the brain to grow new connections. From such instruction, many students began to see themselves as agents of their own brain development. Students who had been disruptive or bored sat still and took note. One particularly unruly boy looked up during the discussion and said, “You mean I don’t have to be dumb?”
It’s a tough call, distinguishing talent from effort. Intimidation and discourage further muddle the waters. But the question is rather whether or not you want to get better. Talented or not, you will not get magically better without effort. Talented or not, you will get better with effort.
So rub your hands together, smack those lips, and join that wonderfully ridiculous schoolboy: “I love me a challenge!”
3 Comments
I just got done with a puzzle on the Python Challenge when I read this post. I do love me a challenge! I’m not often really excited about learning like that schoolboy, but this week is an exception. I enjoyed reading this article and your commentary. I think it will help encourage me to keep learning.
I searched Amazon for the author of the article, and found a page listing a few of her books. I’m considering getting a copy of Self-Theories: Their Role in Motivation, Personality, and Development.That’s why I ask, in interviews, questions equivalent to “how would you move Mount Fuji”.
What count, is the way the person take the challenge, try to tackle the problem and respond to criticism to his ideas.
Ben: That Python Challenge looks cool! I hadn’t thought of searching for Carol S. Dweck, she’s apparently a big shot psychologist and Self Theories seems indeed to be her best book—added to the wishlist! Other psychology books you may like are Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s Flow and Ellen J. Langer’s Mindfulness—they’re among my favorite books ever.
Sergio G.: Heh, that’s actually a very interesting question to ask anyone!Me, I guess I’d start by focusing huge mirrors to the Fuji’s top to lower its temperature and thaw all the snow. The water would be channeled into specially carved out rivers and the water handled as one wished (one could even imagine piping it and carrying it along with the mountain…).
Now that we have mostly rock all around, I’d build a straight, massive track/slide from close to the top of the Fuji to the place where we want to move it. I’d dynamite slice the top, encase it in a wire net, label it carefully, mount it on a wheeled cart, and throw it down the track/slide. Some potential energy liberated on it’s lurch down should prove handy for all the electrical equipment surely to be around. Below, the cubes would be braked and their carts connected into a train and they will be thus carried to the moving site. I’d keep this way until I had cubed and hauled the very base of the Fuji.At the moving site, cubes would be reassembled bottom to top with massive cranes.
Of course all this may be complicated by the fact that Mount Fuji is actually a volcano…(Another interesting question to ask may be: why would a deaf be a good cook? You may also find more interesting questions under the “questions” tag.)