This is one of two blogs addressing the question how to engage students. Based on students’ feedback, the Education Committee has collected good examples of teaching that could serve as an inspiration for teachers. This part is going to be focused on methods that can be implemented in large classes.
The importance of whether students believe in their ability to become smarter (i.e., “mindsets”) in helping students to realize their learning potential is increasingly gaining mainstream attention. But what does it mean to have a certain kind of mindset, how does it develop, and how can it be changed? I discuss a new way of thinking about the nature of mindsets that emphasizes the contextualized nature of mindsets, and that changes the way that we can answer these questions.