Setting an "A" Mindset in the Classroom
First Presenter's Institution
College of Coastal Georgia
First Presenter's Brief Biography
Dr. McGinnis is the Interim Director of Service-Learning & Undergraduate Research and an Assistant Professor of English at the College of Coastal Georgia in Brunswick, GA. Her research focuses on writing, multimodality, minority representation, and student empowerment. She’s received numerous awards and recognitions for her service-learning courses and is Coastal Georgia’s 2022 Scholar of the Year. She holds a Ph.D. in Rhetoric & Composition (Ball State University) and M.A. degrees in Training & Development (Roosevelt University), Women’s & Gender Studies (Roosevelt University), and English & American Literature (Indiana State University).
Document Type
Event
Primary Strand
Mindfulness and Wellbeing
Relevance to Primary Strand
Preliminary analysis of the data I've gathered shows that students' mindfulness and wellbeing is supported by beginning our course with A grades for all of their major assignments and discussing "fixed" and "growth" mindsets. Starting the course with an "A" motivates students and starts courses on a positive note: 86% of students surveyed reported being motivated to work hard to keep the "A" grade that they started the semester with, and 72% agreed that starting the course with an "A" grade made it feel like earning an "A" in the course was within their reach. These statistics are important because 75% of the students surveyed feel that letter grades affect their self-worth. Starting with high letter grades gives them a boost of confidence to put them on the path to success. After discussing "fixed" and "growth" mindsets, students better understood how their beliefs shape the way they approach coursework--84% of those surveyed agreed that understanding their mindset would help them succeed in our course. These tactics in a writing course seem to help mitigate some of the negative associations students have from prior experiences with writing.
Alignment with School Improvement Plan Topics
Student Learning and Development
Brief Program Description
In this presentation, I will present the results of a study I did on classroom tactics that involved beginning the semester with discussion of “fixed” and “growth” mindset alongside starting courses with “A” grades. Of the students surveyed, 84% feel anxiety about their grades often, and 64% felt that starting the course with an A allowed them to focus on their learning with less pressure.
Summary
In this presentation, I first provide a practical model of a course that engages the "A" mindset along with example assignments and reflections that attendees may take and adapt for their own courses. In addition, I include a lesson plan that encourages students to focus on their attitudes towards learning and to understand the mindset they bring into the classroom. Finally, I share data gathered from my own courses to illustrate the effectiveness of the "A" mindset and explore student reactions to the practice. In the IRB-Approved pre- and post-surveys, students rated their agreement to statements like: "Starting the course with an A made me feel confident," "Starting the course with an A made me feel successful," and "Starting the course with an A gives students false hope." Current data shows that 69% of students surveyed felt that "all courses should start with an A."
Evidence
This research is currently being field-tested in an IRB-Approved study. Dweck (1999) argues that student "growth mindset" is an important factor in helping students succeed when completing challenging tasks. In addition, research by Limeri, et. al. (2020), shows that "undergraduate students tend to shift towards a fixed mindset" (p. 8), and they found that mindset continues to have an influence on academic performance (p. 18). This research is an effort to investigate starting courses with an "A" grade as a way to set up what Limeri, et. al., identifies as a "positive feedback loop" where academic performance influences mindset, which before mindset beliefs begin to affect academic performance (p. 16).
Learning Objective 1
Participants will be able to discuss "fixed" and "growth" mindset with their students.
Learning Objective 2
Participants will be able to implement the "A" mindset in their courses to increase student confidence.
Learning Objective 3
Participants will be able to incorporate metacognitive activities to help students become aware of study tactics that work best for them.
Recommended Citation
McGinnis, Mary F., "Setting an "A" Mindset in the Classroom" (2023). Southeast Conference on School Climate. 100.
https://digitalcommons.georgiasouthern.edu/secsc/2023/2023/100
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 License.
Setting an "A" Mindset in the Classroom
In this presentation, I first provide a practical model of a course that engages the "A" mindset along with example assignments and reflections that attendees may take and adapt for their own courses. In addition, I include a lesson plan that encourages students to focus on their attitudes towards learning and to understand the mindset they bring into the classroom. Finally, I share data gathered from my own courses to illustrate the effectiveness of the "A" mindset and explore student reactions to the practice. In the IRB-Approved pre- and post-surveys, students rated their agreement to statements like: "Starting the course with an A made me feel confident," "Starting the course with an A made me feel successful," and "Starting the course with an A gives students false hope." Current data shows that 69% of students surveyed felt that "all courses should start with an A."
