Reactions from First-year Engineering Students to an In-depth Growth Mindset Intervention
Reactions from First-year Engineering Students to an In-depth Growth Mindset Intervention
复制标题
一年级工科学生对深入成长心态干预的反应
DOI：
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发表时间：
2018
期刊：
影响因子：
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通讯作者：
A. Betz
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
E. Dringenberg;Amena S. Shermadou;A. Betz
关于智力本质的信念已被确定为对学术行为至关重要的几个方面的关键杠杆，例如动机、对努力的信念和对挑战的反应。卡罗尔·德韦克（Carol Dweck）提出了一个关于智力的二分法框架：大多数人倾向于认为智力是一种静态的东西，对个人来说是恒定的（固定心态），或者智力是可塑的，随着专注和实践而变化（成长心态）。了解这些信念在学生经历中的作用，可以深入了解他们可能受到激励的方式，他们是否相信持续的努力是有成效的，以及他们是否坚持面对挑战。研究表明，教导学生成长心态的干预措施可以影响个人持有的信念，至少在短时间内。然而，当人们被要求在更长的时间内专门参与成长心态的话题时，他们对个体的反应更为微妙，人们对此知之甚少。本研究有助于解决以下研究问题的研究领域：如何做一年级工程专业的学生反应深入的成长心态干预？为了解决这个问题，两位作者组成了一个由八名一年级工程专业学生组成的Minecraft焦点小组。这个焦点小组在一个学期的课程中举行了五次会议，讨论他们对德韦克2006年流行的Minnesota一书的阅读和反应。学生的书面反映反映了他们对学习经历的反应，这些数据经过了主题分析。重要的发现包括使用成长心态作为一种工具，以反映和解开过去的经验，特别是关于他们的个人经历，由此产生的行为，以及外部影响的作用。成长心态被证明是一个有用的透镜，可以重新考虑过去对经验的解释，并预测朝着成长心态可能发生的变化。学生们明白，成长心态不是一个可以翻转的全有或全无的开关。这些发现对于那些有兴趣促进关于智力本质的生产性信念的教育工作者来说是有用的。在这方面的未来工作将包括这些信念如何改变本科生的经验和具体的策略，为学生开始实施增长的心态在工程教育背景下的发展进行了探索。
Beliefs about the nature of intelligence have been identified as a key lever for several aspects critical to academic behavior, such as motivation, beliefs about effort, and responses to challenges. Carol Dweck provides a dichotomous framework for beliefs about intelligence: most individuals tend to believe that either intelligence is something static that remains constant for an individual (fixed mindset), or that intelligence is malleable and changes with focus and practice (growth mindset). Understanding the role that these beliefs play in the experiences of students provides insight into the ways in which they may be motivated, whether or not they believe that sustained effort is fruitful, and whether or not they persist in the face of challenges. Research has shown that interventions that teach students about growth mindset can impact the beliefs that individuals hold, at least on a short time scale. However, less is known about the more nuanced reactions of individuals when they are asked to engage specifically with the topic of growth mindset over a longer time period. This study contributes to this area of research by addressing the following research question: How do first-year engineering students react to an in-depth growth mindset intervention? In order to address this question, two of the authors formed a Mindset focus group consisting of eight first-year engineering students. This focus group met five times over the course of a semester to discuss their reading of and reaction to Dweck’s popular 2006 Mindset book. Students’ written reflections captured their reaction to the learning experience, and this data was subjected to thematic analysis. Significant findings include the use of growth mindset as a tool to reflect and unpack past experiences, especially with respect to their personal experiences, the resulting behavior, and the role of external influences. Growth mindset proved to be a useful lens to reconsider past interpretations of experiences and project forward on possible changes towards a growth mindset. Students understood that growth mindset was not an all or nothing switch to be flipped. These findings are useful for educators interested in promoting productive beliefs about the nature of intelligence. Future work in this area will include an exploration of how these beliefs change over the undergraduate experience and the development of concrete strategies for students to begin to implement growth mindset within an engineering education context.