Do Now
Turn and Talk: Turn to a neighbor and answer the following
questions based on your learning over the past few days:
• What is one area of your work that has been affirmed (i.e.,
you’re doing it right or on the right track)?
• What is one area that you’ve identified as an area to
improve and what is your action plan?
USING FEEDBACK TO
FOSTER A GROWTH
MINDSET
Melissa McConnell, Principal, Collierville
Elementary, Collierville, TN
Rachel Lebo, Director of PD, JacksonMadison County Schools, Jackson, TN
Resilience
Grit
Persistence
Growth Mindset
http://youtu.be/pN34FNbOKXc
Turn and Talk
• How does this translate to teachers
and principals? What are the
characteristics of a teacher or principal
with a fixed mindset? Growth mindset?
• Which do you want and why?
6
From Individual Feedback to a
Culture of Continuous Learning
“If, like those with the growth mindset, you believe you can
develop yourself, then you're open to accurate information
about your current abilities, even it it's unflattering. What's
more, if you're oriented toward learning, as they are, you
need accurate information about your current abilities in
order to learn effectively”
-Carol Dweck, Mindset
7
The Research
From The Ripple Effect:
“For example, when researchers examined the
effectiveness of data-use initiatives, they found that
student learning gains occurred as a result of such
initiatives only when the principal in charge held the
belief that improvement was possible”
-Wahlstrom, Seashore-Louis, Leithwood, & Anderson
Characteristics of
Growth vs Fixed Mindset
You Can Teach a Growth Mindset!
• Avoid labels and fixed-mindset praise
• Celebrate deliberate practice, process and
progress, not outcomes
• Create a culture where learning and risk-taking
are valued
• Be transparent with your own effort, learning and
mistakes
• Focus your feedback around process and
progress, not scores or metrics
Turn and Talk
• How does the teacher evaluation
framework in your district foster a
growth mindset? How does it create
obstacles?
You Can Teach a Growth Mindset!
• Avoid labels and fixed-mindset praise
• Celebrate deliberate practice, process and
progress, not outcomes
• Create a culture where learning and risk-taking
are valued
• Be transparent with your own effort, learning and
mistakes
• Focus your feedback around process and
progress, not scores or metrics
Teacher evaluation that fosters growth
mindset would be:
• Focus on formative assessment and provide room to
•
•
•
•
learn from mistakes
Focus on self-reflection and learning
Label strategies not people
Focus on process, not outcomes
Focus on feedback, not labels
You can shift the focus…
• Focus on formative
•
•
•
•
assessment and provide
room to learn from
mistakes
Focus on self-reflection
and learning
Label strategies not
people
Focus on process, not
outcomes
Focus on feedback, not
labels
Provide multiple
opportunities for un-scored
formative feedback
Build in opportunities for
self-reflection
Change the structure
and/or content of your preand post-conferences
Provide Multiple Opportunities for
Feedback
Build in Opportunities for SelfReflection
• Goal-setting
• Self-assessment
• Analysis of student work
Change the Structure of Your PostConference
Feedback is one of the most powerful influences on
learning and achievement, but this impact can be either
positive or negative. Its power is frequently mentioned in
articles about learning and teaching, but surprisingly few
recent studies have systematically investigated its
meaning…. This evidence shows that although feedback is
among the major influences, the type of feedback and the
way it is given can be differentially effective.
--J. Hattie
All Feedback is Not Created Equal
http://vimeo.com/38247060
Turn and Talk
• What were the elements of effective
feedback that you observed?
Effective Feedback
• Goal-referenced
• Specific
• Actionable
• User-friendly
• Timely
Restructure Your Post-Conference
• Frame the conversation:
• Ask your teacher what students were expected to know
and be able to do at the end of the lesson? How do you
know this is the right goal to eventually lead to mastery
of the standard?
Restructure Your Post-Conference
• Spend time discussing an area of strength:
• Ask teacher what went well and why.
• Focus on the process that led the teacher to this area of
strength “How did you learn to do this?” “How do you
know it’s effective?”
• How might this be similarly effective with other lessons?
Restructure Your Post-Conference
• Help the teacher identify the area that, if
improved, would have the greatest impact on the
stated goal:
• Use questions that again focus on process and not
outcomes
• Make it clear that you are carving out a space for
learning, not judgment
• Focus the conversation on student learning, not teacher
actions
Focus Questions on Process and
Learning
• What did you do to prepare for this?
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Describe your process for planning a lesson/teaching this skill/…
How much progress have your students made on this? What have
been the most significant drivers of that progress and how do you
keep that going?
What could be better and what would that mean for kids?
How to do you get there?
How might you improve the way students engaged in X?
Can we practice that skill together?
What was the most challenging thing about teaching this lesson?
How did you prepare for that and how might you prepare for it
differently next time?
How did you learn to do this and was it always as effective as it
was today?
Turn and Talk
• What are the unique challenges in providing feedback to
your most effective teachers? How can you shift the
emphasis in the post-conference to make this a more
meaningful conversation for them?
Turn and Talk
• What are the implications of the Growth-Mindset research
for your ‘level 5’ teachers?
5 attributes of a teacher with a growth
mindset:
• They take responsibility for improving their practice
• They see setbacks and feedback as an opportunity to
learn and grow their skills
• They actively seek learning opportunities and new
challenges
• They have positive and high expectations of their students
• They use growth mindset language when teaching and
with themselves
It’s okay not to know.
It’s okay not to know. ..yet
Thank you!
• Rachel Lebo, rglebo@jmcss.org
• Melissa McConnell, mmcconnell@colliervilleschools.org