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Math 7-9 > Factors > Math Mindset

Math Mindset

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Math Mindset includes learners' self-concept and self-efficacy beliefs as well as their mindset toward failure, all of which shape their willingness to get involved with mathematics. The beliefs that students have about themselves as a "math person" and their ability to do math often have a cyclical relationship with achievement (e.g., previous academic achievement fosters particular beliefs which in turn predict future achievement).

Main Ideas

Student attitudes and beliefs can be shaped by their Math Learning Environment and experiences with mathematics; for example, math educators' perceptions of students' abilities may vary based on race or gender, such as underestimating the performance of Black or Latino students or girls in math. Math Mindset includes students' beliefs about their own ability and about the meaning of struggle and effort with regard to mathematics.

  • Self-concept: A student with high math self-concept is someone for whom math is central to their self and perhaps views themselves as a "math person". As students go through schooling, they begin defining what domains of study are central to them in part by their academic experience but also based upon their social environment (e.g., stereotypes about who should be good at math).
  • Self-efficacy: Self-efficacy includes one's confidence and belief in their ability to complete a task. A learner with high self-efficacy retains the belief that they are capable of shaping the environment and their own academic outcomes.
  • Attitude toward errors: Students' attitudes toward making errors and whether they believe mistakes can be helpful in improving can affect their learning process. Many students view failure and having to put in effort on a task as a sign that you lack math ability (i.e., "fixed mindset") while others view failure and effort as useful and necessary for learning (i.e., "growth mindset").

Learners with stronger Math Mindsets are more likely to persist, for example, re-working challenging problems and discarding incorrect strategies. These positive attitudes toward figuring math out are beneficial for learning and making connections across concepts. However, beliefs about the self and math are not always based in truth: girls' performance in math is similar to boys, yet they often express lower confidence and more negative attitudes around math compared to boys. This "confidence gap" emerges during middle school. Because students are actively interpreting educational events in their lives (e.g., a challenging math activity, a low grade in math class, a comment by a parent), it is important for teachers and parents to help students understand what leads people to become efficacious in mathematics.

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Research-Based Strategies For This Factor

Cognitively Demanding Tasks

Providing math tasks with high cognitive demand conveys high expectations for all students by challenging them to engage in higher-order thinking.

Error Analysis

Analyzing incorrect worked examples is especially beneficial for helping students develop a conceptual understanding of mathematical processes.

Foster Growth Mindset

Teachers can help students understand that learning involves effort, mistakes, and reflection by teaching them about their malleable brain and modeling their own learning process.

Goal Setting & Monitoring

Setting overall goals, as well as smaller goals as steps to reaching them, encourages consistent, achievable progress and helps students feel confident in their skills and abilities.

Growth Mindset Feedback

Providing feedback that focuses on the process of developing skills conveys the importance of effort and motivates students to persist when learning.

Guided Inquiry

In guided inquiry, teachers help students use their own language for constructing knowledge by active listening and questioning.

Incorporate Students' Cultural Practices

Learning about students' cultures and connecting them to instructional practices helps foster a Sense of Belonging and mitigate Stereotype Threat.

Peer Teaching

Having students teach their knowledge, skills, and understanding to their classmates strengthens learning.

Positive Self-talk

When students reframe negative thoughts and tell themselves kind self-statements, they practice positive self-talk.

Real-world Math

When teachers connect math to the students' world, students see how math is relevant and applicable to their daily lives.

Response Devices

Response devices boost engagement by encouraging all students to answer every question.

Rich Resources: Children's Literature

Children's literature can be a welcoming way to help students learn math vocabulary and concepts.

Strengths-based Approach

A strengths-based approach is one where educators intentionally identify, communicate, and harness students' assets, across many aspects of the whole child, in order to empower them to flourish.

Student-generated Problems

When students create their own number and word problems, they connect math concepts to their background knowledge and lived experiences.

Student-led Conferences

Student-led conferences are meetings between students, parents, and teachers where the student actively leads the conversation by reflecting on their progress toward goals and sharing examples of their work.

Think-Pair-Share

Students deepen their math understanding as they use and hear others use specific math language in informal ways.

Untimed Tests

Untimed tests provide students the opportunity to flexibly and productively work with numbers, further developing their problem-solving abilities.

Worked Examples

Analyzing and discussing solved problems helps students develop a deeper understanding of abstract mathematical processes.

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