Developing a More Robust Growth Mindset in Korean Students Wanting to Study Overseas

Allison J Parsons

Lamar University

This paper will revisit the initial planning document entitled Planning with the Growth Mindset, written for course EDLD 5302.  While continually learning theories and ideas based on learning and the learning environment, one could argue the importance of reevaluating earlier thoughts and plans in order to best support students and learners in general.  This paper will continue analyzing the growth mindset while incorporating ideas on the learning environment to match proper highly effective frameworks to support the growth of potential foreign exchange students within the recruiting business framework.  This paper will also look at other factors to be considered that impacts the growth mindset along with the higher chance of student success.  

Developing a More Robust Growth Mindset in Korean Students Wanting to Study Overseas

 Utilizing multiple aspects of continual learning it can be assumed a business plan in an ever-changing environment needs to be revisited and revised in order to stay ahead of technology and advancement of educational theories.  As students make decisions on their future, it is imperative that those students work towards personal growth and learning throughout their educational endeavors and throughout their life.  It has been argued that growth mindset alone has no significant impact on student success, then it begs the question of what other factors along with a growth mindset can induce measurable, positive results in our learners.  It will be argued that a combination of growth mindset with a fruitful learning environment can dovetail success in students by preparing said students with reasonable expectations in combination with a clear concise end goals with checkpoints along the way.  

Revisiting the Original Growth Mindset Plan

The Harvard Business Review states, “A sophisticated understanding of failure’s causes and contexts will help to avoid the blame game and institute an effective strategy for learning from failure.” (Edmondson) Although the article is looking at learning from failure on the corporate side of the spectrum, one can use the same views of failure in their personal lives as well.  Edmondson proposes five step process to learn from failures.  These five steps can guide the growth mindset.  Looking into the positives of failures in an equitable manner, one is able to transform the burden of failure into a light for future success.  As Dweck states, “instead of luxuriating in the power of yet, one can be gripped in the tyranny of now.” (Dweck, 2:05)  With the power and support of knowing that not now does not mean not ever, my students can be encouraged to continue on their path of knowledge with the understanding that they will eventually have the ability to comprehend and succeed.  Looking further at the five steps one can incorporate the following five steps into their lives thus creating the power of yet.  The five steps are as follows; keeping intelligent failures at the frontier, building a learning culture, detecting failure, analyzing failure, and promoting experimentation.  Looking back to the original Growth Mindset plan the addition to the previous five steps to Dr. Dweck’s four-step process to change your mindset with a proper learning environment can propel students to success within the business model.   

Intelligent failures at the frontier, not knowing yet and a culture of learning.

“Failures in this category can rightly be considered ‘good’ because they provide valuable new knowledge that can help an organization leap ahead of the competition and ensure its future growth.” (Edmondson, p9). Within the business model at A International Recruiting Agency, there are times students will not have an answer to a question and they have never experienced the situation in their life.  At this point one can either give up or one can say the answer is not known yet.  By looking at the need for experimentation to solve the problem one can assume that with further experimentation and possible failures the knowledge gained can make the individual more marketable and more knowledgeable than their peers.  For example, the need to understand the content provided that is not in your native (L1) language, some form of experimentation might be necessary to understand the appropriate means needed to comprehend the subject matter.  This experimentation might be presented in terms of trial and error.  Knowing that with each error brings someone one step closer to the answer.  This in essence is bringing intelligent failures to the frontier.  This combination of Dweck’s power of yet with Edmondson’s steps in learning from failure, it can be argued that an individual is closer to unlocking life changing information.  

One can continue with these steps by also including the proper learning environment.  Visiting the culture of learning response, my business can look at how the business plan of building a library of information will continually be updated and added.  As students experience life in another country, new challenges not ever faced by others can and will occur.  Initiating the expectation of learning within my students, a mindset of learning from intelligent failures can create growth within the situation instead of causing a termination of action due to fear of failure.  In other words, no matter how much information is present on my business website there will no doubt be missing information.  To overcome the gaps in information, it is important to have students develop a sense of grit and determination as they study overseas.  

Building a learning culture where the learning philosophy of growth is more than a fad.

According to Dr. Dweck, the first step in avoiding a fixed mindset is to recognize your fixed mindset voice.  This fixed mindset voice is not a fad.  One can say this with certainty by examining examples of fixed mindsets and determining if these examples have just started in the last few years or decades or if these examples have been around since the dawn of time.  

Futurefocuslearning.net lists the following; “Either I’m good at something or I’m not, I can’t learn now; it’s too late, There’s no point in trying if I’m going to fail, I take feedback as a personal attack, I always struggle with, I feel threatened/intimidated by success of others, I can’t make this any better; it is what it is, my current abilities are the measure of my outcomes, I already know everything I need to know, and lastly, I’ve always been told I can’t ___________. (futurefocus.net) 

It can be argued that this mindset has been generationally engrained in our thoughts throughout history.  It is the ability to overcome this self-doubt that produces the spark to success.  Much like what a presented in the learning philosophy from a previous assignment.  In such, the ability to learn is the creation of the environment in which the journey to learning is most important.  Much in tune with the thoughts of Arthur Ashe at his April 8, 1992, press conference, “Success is a journey, not a destination.  The doing is often more important than the outcome.” (Ashe & Rampersad, Epilogue) Learning can and should be felt much in the same manner.  One best learns by doing and experiencing and each step of the journey is helping build knowledge.  If knowledge is the end goal and as such that is the goal of education therefore, as in the growth mindset grades should not be the determining factor in achievement, but the journey itself that led to knowledge is all that matters.  Therefore, when students adopt the growth mindset grades will not be the determining factor to success, but instead the obtaining of knowledge will lead to success.  Moving forward, students who study overseas to study should not be concerned about the letter grade, but they should be more concerned of the real-world knowledge they gained from the experience.  There are three main activities essential to learning from failure.  As we grow in learning from failure, we can learn from detecting failure, analyzing the failure and experimenting with what made one fail.  

Detecting failure while sustaining choices in the learner’s mindset.

Failure is bond to happen no matter what precautions are taken to prevent failure.  However, it is more important on how one reacts to the failure as opposed to the failure itself.  As Dr. Dweck states, we have a choice, and we must recognize that we have a choice.  Choice is one of the vital four steps we need to understand in order for us to adopt a growth mindset.  Inasmuch, one my students fail on any part of the process, they must have the comfort in knowing they have a choice on how they respond to said failure.  As Edmondson advises to corporations on having the choice on how to respond and detect potential failures.  Edmondson recommends using the model of a nuclear power plant.  If the smallest change is detected or the smallest abnormality is detected, then an investigation of determining the reason for the changes is immediately started.  Unlike that of one of the greatest disasters in NASA history.  “During the Columbia space shuttle investigation, NASA managers spent some two weeks downplaying the seriousness of a piece of foam’s having broken off the left side of the shuttle at launch.”  The ignoring of a small failure resulted in a calamitous failure a few weeks later.  The same can be said with our students, the ability to detect a failure or the potential for failure can serve our students well.  By understanding these potential hiccups, one can utilizing the underlying importance of the learning situational factors.  The business plan starts to be adapted from this point.  Being able to state the three pronged end goals for my students I was able to outline the paths of understanding to have students realize their goals.  With that being said a rudimentary website began to take shape.  The BHAG or Big Hairy Audacious Goal was to have my students go to North America with the highest potential of success through creating a bank of background knowledge.   The first main goal was to afford students the information needed to fill out the application forms correctly.  As I prepared to think of this first goal, experience with each step brought about potential roadblocks that may be present.  And as such, the attempt to encourage a growth mindset through a community of assistance was brought to bear.  How would one handle an application being rejected?  How can one overcome this roadblock?  Much like the Columbia engineers one could ignore the potential or one could be like a nuclear power plant and investigate and remedy a potential threat to success.   It bears to have in mind, the necessary culture, systems and procedures need to be in place for failures to be a lesson.  Individually, a culture of learning even from failure needs to be at the forefront of my business model.  Secondly, when failure presents itself, it is important for my students to have the proper systems in place to overcome the failures.  For example, if an application is rejected where can they go to research their mistakes and reapply.  Or, if a student is unable to understand a course, what can they do to get the extra tutoring.  This leads into the procedures needed to live in a foreign country.  What are the cultural procedures in North America?  Our website is being revamped to introduce cultural procedures to know when living and studying in North America.  This examination of cultural difference can serve our students well as they live and travel.  However, with all these supports to prevent failure, there will no doubt be failure along the journey.  Knowing that, it is how to use failure as a tool for growth. 

Analyzing failure while looking to learn from the analysis.

As failure occurs, it is not easy to overcome the self-doubt it creates.  At its nature failure is defeating and determination and grit play important roles in overcoming failure.  However, when analyzing said failure it is imperative to delve deep into the fabric of the failure and avoid glossing over the superficial reasoning to best understand the root cause.  The dictionary defines grit as “courage and resolve; strength of character.” (dictionary.com) Edmondson states, “Analyzing failure requires the discipline-better yet, the enthusiasm- to use sophisticated analysis to ensure that the right lessons are learned and the right remedies are employed.” (Edmondson) An analysis of failure when performed properly, creates discovery and wisdom contained within the failure.  When looking at utilizing the UbD design within my business, it became apparent that there was potential failure in my business.  The analysis of my design showed the lack of looking at potential successes and failures in students. There tends to be similarities between those who are successful in studying abroad.  Those characteristics should be sought after in order for success to be realized.  For this to be effective means effective questions and examinations of individuals would need to be developed.  Having the end goal in mind, it was stated that successful exchange students is my assessment of a goal realized.  For this to become true, there would need to be information shared and adopted in order to grow their background knowledge.  Once I started to use the UbD design, I began to analyze past failures in business.  I began to ask what was missing for those students that did not have a positive experience when studying abroad.  By analyzing my business and looking at its goals I uncovered three potential issues; the student was not properly informed on the differences between both cultures, the student did not realize all the sacrifices that need to be shouldered in order to immigrate and/or the type of university or location did not match the desires of the student.  There is no doubt more learning that needs to be accomplished as tendencies morph and as such the business model must adapt as well.  

Looking at life through different lenses to see potential.

Different is not defined as wrong but is defined as not being the same.  How one gains knowledge will not look the same in everyone.  Knowledge growth can come in various forms and so, one should experiment on how one learns.  Moving forward from this theory, if a student learns in various ways then teachers should teach in various ways.  This experimentation should be promoted so that success in learning can be garnered by more individuals.  Reflecting on the learnings from EDLD 5313, this growth mindset plan has grown and incorporated a multitude of ideas.  Reflecting on the first semester, it can be argued that the potential in my business has growth significantly.  By reducing the effective filter and encouraging a community of learners students will be more apt to take a chance on studying abroad.  Humans are by their nature curious beings, and designing a student safe environment to experiment with living overseas, students would be more willing to take the risk of starting their own journey.  Much like I have learned through this process, my students would also learn that the steps taking are more of a lesson than the destination will ever be.

References

Ashe, A., & Rampersad, A. (1994). Days of grace A memoir. Ballantine Books. 

Crockett, L. (n.d.). The growth mindset choice: 10 fixed mindset examples we can change. Future Focused Learning Insights. Retrieved March 4, 2023, from https://blog.futurefocusedlearning.net/fixed-mindset-examples 

Dictionary.com. (n.d.). Grit definition & meaning. Dictionary.com. Retrieved March 4, 2023, from https://www.dictionary.com/browse/grit 

Dweck, C. S. (2014, September 12). The power of yet |Carol S Dweck | tedxnorrköping. YouTube. Retrieved March 4, 2023, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J-swZaKN2Ic 

Edmondson, A. C. (2022, November 7). Strategies for learning from failure. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved March 4, 2023, from https://hbr.org/2011/04/strategies-for-learning-from-failure