Growth Mindset

I had a really hard time finding an artifact that I felt like showcased my growth mindset. I ended up choosing this quiz as a whole because, as I have mentioned on my previous pages, I still struggle with counting methods and probability questions, and yet I did well on this quiz, and I truly think it was because of the mindset I had going into it. 

Math has always been the hardest subject for me learn, reading, writing, history, science, they all came easy to me, but math? Math is a different story. Due to my prolonged struggle with math as a whole, I tend to lean towards more of a fixed mindset, thinking that I am never going to get better, and it is just so hard and frustrating. I was feeling especially frustrated with this unit, I would think I understood how to properly use counting methods and probability, and then I would come across another question I didn't know how to do. When I was doing the homework and studying for this quiz, I was definitely thinking in a fixed mindset more than a growth one. I was stressed, thinking about how badly I was going to do on the test, even trying to see how much a bad score on this quiz would affect my grade. 

I don't know what caused it, but it felt like a slap in the face, what was I doing? Sitting here thinking negatively is definitely not going to help me pass this quiz. I was able to recognize that I was stuck in a fixed mindset and change to start thinking in more of a growth mindset. I continued to study and tried to prepare myself as much as possible, while still acknowledging that I could only do my best and making mistakes is how you truly learn. I am not going to lie, I did not walk into class confident about taking the quiz, but I also wasn't allowing myself to doubt my abilities. I had worked hard for this, and now it was time to showcase my hard work to the best of my ability. There were still parts of the quiz that I got stuck on or didn't feel very confident in, however I didn't allow myself to wallow in those thought patterns like I normally would, I was able to remind myself that either way this experience was beneficial and would help me learn. 

When we got this quiz back and saw that I actually did fairly well, I was beyond proud of myself. I couldn't believe it, after how much I had struggled and how confused and defeated I felt, I had managed to pull through, and that in and of itself was a huge accomplishment. I think that if I had gone into class on that Tuesday, dreading the quiz and already planning on failing, I would have. I think the main thing that led to getting a good score on that quiz was the fact that I was able to have grace with myself and remain in a growth mindset.