The terms fixed mindset and growth mindset are used to describe the underlying beliefs that people have about learning and intelligence. When children believe they can get smarter, they understand that effort makes them stronger. Therefore, they put in extra time and effort, and that leads to higher achievement. At Beech Hill, we believe that our children should have a growth mindset and a positive outlook towards their learning.
In the school year 2018-19, Beech Hill took part in a national research trial run by Rosendale School in London and funded by the EEF around metacognition called ReflectED. We were part of the project for 18 months and our results fed into the final data and outcomes. The results of the trial can be found here-
As the results showed a positive impact in maths, we decided to keep elements of the trial in our maths practice at school.
These are some steps that we go through in our lessons (mainly seen in maths)
- Before we learn something new, we think about our knowledge already and if we know anything about the topic before we begin
- After and sometimes during lessons, we will think about what we learned that lesson and also what helped us learn
- We can also look at any mistakes we made and use them to help us in the future. Children are encouraged to use mistakes to help shape their learning
- By understanding what went right and wrong in the lesson and why, we will gain a deeper understanding of our learning
- We will learn to set ourselves next steps, which will help us take control of our learning journey
We also ask the children to complete a ‘new skills’ lesson, where they learn to do something completely new. This skill is not academic but something practical such as tying shoelaces, folding origami or using chopsticks. Learning this skill will give them new ways of developing strategies to apply to their academic learning in the future. These lessons will be taking place in Spring term this year.