The Secret To Raising Smart Kids Summary

The article “Are We Raising a Generation of Helpless Kids” by Mickey Goodman appears on the Huffington Post, an online news aggregator and blog. The author focuses on explaining that children who are allowed to make choices and decisions on their own should be a thing of the past. He also touches on the idea that children learning valuable life lessons in our generation are not getting things done. The article tells the reader that the parents of the children today should prepare their kids for failure in life, and show them how to actually succeed in life without handouts.

Roger Von Oech proved that a person who has no experience in failing would not have enough strength or a harder time getting back up. In his article, “To Err Is Wrong”, he talks about having a friend who just graduated with a master degree and is having a hard time getting a job. He says her problem is, “she doesn’t know how to fail”(Oech 89). He explains that because of her inexperience in failing, she is afraid of taking chances in doing what might not go right. For me, I have failed at many things like writing an essay but like many people when I receive the grade I just don’t throw the essay.

In “The Secret Of Raising Smart Kids”, Carol S. Dweck suggests overpraising children may be counterproductive. Effort, not intelligence or ability, is the key to success in school and life according to the article. Dweck claims there are two views of intelligence, “growth mind-set” and “fixed mind-set”. “Fixed mind-set” is when a student believes that intelligence is a fixed trait and losses confidence when errors are made attributed to their lack of ability. “Growth mind-set” thinks of intelligence as something that can be developed through education and difficult work. Instead of praising a child for their intelligence she suggests giving them a pat on the back for effort. Also, Dweck states that children can develop a “growth mind-set” through a workshop involving a series of study skills sessions and classes on how to apply a “growth mind-set” to school work. I find it hard to agree with Dweck’s claims that there are only two views of intelligence, a proper way to praise, and proposes a child can make up their own mind-set through her workshops.

“The idea of trying and still failing - of leaving yourself without excuses - is the worst fear within the fixed mindset” (Dweck, 2016, p. 42). At least with a growth mindset a failure means one tried. There is nothing wrong with failure as long as the effort was present. In order to achieve maximum effort it can consist of one’s ability, drive, and any additional help an individual is willing to take.

Imagine a room full of 30 plus 12th-grade colonists on the first day of school at Anaheim high school and the math teacher asks what is the square root of 16? Nothing but the noise of sheer silence falls across the room. How can a room full of students that have been going to school for 12 years not answer that simple question and how can we increase the success of students that go Anaheim high school? In order to increase the success of students at Anaheim schools the summer has to be shorter and the days longer. In the article “Marita’s bargain” the author Gladwell explains how time is used in regular schools compared to the KIPP Academy in the Bronx and other school systems with short summers and longer days.The article shows how more time

“The Secret to Raising Smart Kids” by Carol S. Dweck is about the development of a child’s mentality when it comes to their self-confidence as well their capability of learning and working hard. Dweck informs the reader that there are two types of children and people in general when it comes to learning as well as growing. One group are the helpless people and one group are those with a growth mindset. Whether a person falls into the helpless or those willing to grow greatly impacts their success as well as their future.

For a student at Anaheim school to be successful, they need the help from the schools. Schools should be able to encourage every student to be success. Not every student is at the same intelligence level so schools need to find a way for them to learn and be great. Anaheim schools can improve student success if the following changes take place: there needs to be longer periods, more school, days, less summer vacation, schools should be able to encourage student to not give up and showing them that effort and determination will help them be successful. How to improve success Imagine going back to school on the first day and get quizzed to see what you still remember from the past school year.

In order for changes to happen and help this percentage reach the average requirement improvements need to happen here at Anaheim schools. A way to improve students success in Anaheim schools is by teaching students to have a growth mindset. Those students who work with a growth mindset take on challenges and those who don’t give up and don’t do well. In “The Secret To Raising Smart Kids,” by, Dweck, Carol the importance of students education is discussed by the two types of mindsets a student should have. The first type is called a growth mindset and having this mindset allows the student to take risks when a problem gets difficult.

Thank you, for sharing your personal experience. I agree with the article, "Raising Smart Kids" was enlightening and detailed on the topic of fixed mind-set and growth mind-set. I learned that if we nurture a growth mind-set in our homes and at schools we will give children the “tools to thrive in their quests and to become accountable employees and citizen” (Dweck, 2007, p. 6). In the long run my goal as an educator is to prepare students to become responsible citizens and help them thrive. Carol Dweck, stated, educators could improve their students' learning if they “persistently encouraged them to think about their mental skills as malleable, rather than as properties fixed at birth” (Glenn, 2010, p.5).

Paul Tough is a Canadian-American author, broadcaster, and journalist, best known for his research and writing in education, parenting, poverty, and politics. He is a contributing writer to the New York Times Magazine and has written pieces that appeared in the New Yorker, the Atlantic, GQ, and Esquire. He is also the author of Whatever It Takes: Geoffrey Canada’s Quest to Change Harlem and America (2008), How Children Succeed: Grit, Curiosity, and the Hidden Power of Character (2012), and Helping Children Succeed: What Works and Why (2016). His second book How Children Succeed was translated into 27 languages and spent more than a year on the New York Times best-seller list.

Dweck, Cords. “The Secret to Raising Smart Kids” Collection, Edited by Beers, Hougen, Jago et Al, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015, PP.21-26

The education system has not changed in many years and doesn’t fit today’s circumstances. Some Students aren’t benefiting from the educational system implemented today and are going off to college unprepared specially minority students (Wagner, xix). If students aren’t succeeding in school then those students are receiving the proper help they need. Something is wrong and should be fixed immediately, because it’s not right that not all students are striving in their education. The best way for Anaheim students to succeed is to incorporate different learning methods, because each student has a unique learning style. There’s many different learning styles to incorporate in a classroom for all students. Some students might be a visual, auditory or a kinesthetic learner, teachers need to assimilate lessons to fit all student’s need. However when having a student-teacher ratio of 30+:1 it’s difficult to accommodate to everyone’s needs, but not impossible when teachers accommodate to major learning styles.

Through out my high school career I never took my education seriously. For most of the four years it was a big blur. I’m not quite sure if it was because of me or if I found myself blaming my surroundings or teachers for my lack of focus and strive to learn. A failure can mean different things to everyone else. Maybe there’s just different types or categories of failures. These failures are meant to teach us something, or motivate us to simply not make these mistakes again.

The nine-month, 180-day school year is not a relic of our agrarian past. Alexander found that the poorest kids “outlearn” their wealthier peers in terms of knowledge gained during the academic year, but during the summer months they fall further behind. In order to increase student success at Anaheim High School is we should have a longer school year, instead of more summer breaks. In the article “Marita’s Bargain” by Malcolm Gladwell, offers evidence stating “The United States is, on average, 180 days long. The South Korean school year is 220. The Japanese school year is 243 days long” (9). According to the evidence from the article, it proves that kids in the United States should have more school days because fewer school days they have, the less knowledge they earn in a whole year. Kids in Asian countries are doing much better with school, just for having more days just from looking at South Korea and Japan, they have the highest rate for longer days from school. I wouldn’t mind, having the same days as Japan has, instead of having a shorter school year because you really don’t learn anything by the end of it. Schools in the United States should stop having long summer days “The long summer vacation a prealiar and distinctively American legacy that has had profound consequences for the learning patterns” (6). If we have long summer breaks kids would start having problems with learning simple things and especially if it’s going to be a new school and there are serious

In order for student success to take place the students need to try and actually do their work. They also need to be paying attention to their teacher while the teacher is teaching the lesson. The class did their research by watching a documentary on students who are in an extracurricular activity and the class also read research based articles. The students at Anaheim schools can improve student success if the following take place: schooldays need to be longer, students need to change their mindset, and the students need to be in an extracurricular activity.