Dubbing the growth mindset theory as “the new learning styles” is “unfair and wrong”, Professor Dylan Wiliam has said today.
Speaking at the Festival of Education, the educationalist and emeritus professor of educational assessment at UCL Institute of Education defended the theory and said it has proven benefits for students.
He said: “There has been a lot of pushback recently and I have had people describe the growth mindset as the new learning styles, and I think that’s simply unfair and wrong.
Growth mindset: where did it go wrong?
Long read: Is growth mindset the new learning styles?
Pedagogy Focus on growth mindset
“Any teacher who thinks growth mindset doesn’t help is denying themselves something that has got a proven benefit for their students and I think it would be crazy to not try to use it in some way.”
Wiliam explained that the results of meta-analyses that found growth mindset interventions had small effect sizes need to be interpreted in context, arguing that those results actually indicate a 20 per cent increase in the rate of students’ learning.
He said: ”Almost all the studies that Sisk and colleagues reviewed were conducted in children over the age of 10, where one year’s learning is at most .4 standard deviations if you are using standardised testing...which most of the studies did.
“So a .08 effect size is actually a 20 per cent or more increase in the rate of learning. And given that most of these interventions took an hour or less, I think it is incredibly important.”
He also referred to another study, which found that growth mindset interventions delivered online “have a substantial impact on student achievement”.
He added: “The other point about growth mindset is that it’s a means to an end, not an end in itself. For me, the main value of growth mindset interventions is to get children more receptive to feedback.
“If you have a fixed mindset, feedback is unwelcome, because it might tell you you are not as smart as you thought you were. If you have a growth mindset, feedback helps you maximise your improvement, by focusing your improvement on the things that are most likely to improve you.”
