Blog Post #4

Has this lesson changed your view of failure and success in school and in life? How? What words of advice would you offer to someone who feels like a failure?

What does growth mindset mean to you? Why is this an important attribute to cultivate? How can teachers and adults in your life help you create a growth mindset?

Failure tends to make people give up on thei goals and dreams. But what would happen if more people changed their perspective on failure? What if more people veiwed failure as simply a starting point?

This lesson reminded me of the importance of failing. people who have never failed have never tried anything anything new. This lesson actually reminded me of when I first started to learn to ski as a little kid. I was terrified to learn how to ski and even more scared of falling down. I remember my brother said to me, "Audrey I'm going to be honest with you. You are going to fall down and it probally will hurt. But you know what you do when you fall? You get right back up and try again." And he was right I did fall... a lot, but no matter how many times I fell I always got up. And it's a good thing I didn't give up way back then because I know am an avid skier! In school I feel like it easy to feel like a failure. This lesson reminded me the importance of learning from your mistakes. Whether it be doing bad in a class, forgetting an assignment, instead of feeling like a failure I should learn from my mistakes.

To me growth mindset means you are believe in your ability to become better through hard work and the help of others. it means failure doesn't define you but it pushes you to to keep going. If someone feels like a failure I would ask them what would happen if they kept going? Thomas Eddision had 1,000 failed attempts at inventing the light bulb. Michael Jordan got cut from his highschool basketball team. Walt Disney got fired from his job as his editor thought he "lacked imagination and good ideas." All of these famous people faced failure and could have given up. But they didn't. If they had given up after they faced failure they would have never achieved success. I would tell the person who feels like a failure to keep going as they never know what awaits them next.

There are a lot of things teachers and adults can do to help me create a growth mindest. Teachers can help students like myself learn from mistakes and failures. After a bad test, a teacher could give students a chacne to retake the test to learn from what they did wrong. An english teacher could let a student make revisions to a an essay they recived a bad grade on. This would teach students like myself to learn from their mistakes and rise from failure. It is important to be able to have a growth mindset so you are able to push yourself to be the best version of yourself and learn from your mistakes. Other adults in my life such as my parents could help my cultivate a growth mindset by reitering the importance of not giving up after I have failed something.

Failure is something everyone faces in their lifetime. It doesn't matter how many times a person fails but it matters what they do after they fail. It is important to learn from your mistakes, and to keep going! Failure is only a desitination if you choose to make it one!