{"id":1651,"date":"2012-02-09T14:01:13","date_gmt":"2012-02-09T14:01:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/progmanager.wordpress.com\/?p=256"},"modified":"2012-02-09T14:01:13","modified_gmt":"2012-02-09T14:01:13","slug":"are-we-learning-or-just-looking-good","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2012\/02\/09\/are-we-learning-or-just-looking-good\/","title":{"rendered":"Are we learning? Or just looking good?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-40\" title=\"track\" src=\"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/wp-content\/uploads\/track.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"130\" height=\"87\" \/>Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck made a great distinction between <em>performance goals<\/em> and\u00a0<em>learning goals<\/em>.<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong><em>Performance goals<\/em><\/strong> are about \u201cwinning positive\u00a0judgements\u00a0of your competence and avoiding negative ones. In other\u00a0words, when students pursue performance goals they\u2019re concerned with their level of intelligence: They want to look smart (to themselves or others) and avoid looking dumb.\u201d A person usually does this by playing it safe.<\/li>\n<li><strong><em>Learning goals<\/em><\/strong> are ones that are about increasing your competence. \u201cIt reflects a desire to learn new skills, master new tasks, or understand new things\u2014a desire to get smarter.\u201d<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Both goals are common and can drive achievement. So there\u2019s nothing wrong with either.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn fact,\u201d she says, \u201cin the best of all possible worlds, students could achieve both goals at the same time.\u201d Unfortunately, we don\u2019t live in the best of all possible worlds. One is usually pitted against the other. \u201cThe tasks that are best for learning are often challenging ones that involve displaying ignorance and risking periods of confusion and errors. The tasks that are best for looking smart are often ones that students are already good at and won\u2019t really learn as much from doing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>What she has found is that an overemphasis on performance goals \u2013 wanting to look good \u2013 can foster a helpless response. In a 1988 study they found that \u201cmany of the students with performance goals showed a clear helpless pattern in response to difficulty. A number of them condemned their ability, and their problem solving deteriorated.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn sharp contrast, most of the students with learning goals showed a clear mastery-oriented pattern. In the face of failure, they did not worry about their intellect, they remained focused on the task, and they maintained their effective problem-solving strategies.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen children are focused on measuring themselves from their performance, failure is more likely to provoke a helpless response. When children are instead focused on learning, failure is likely to provoke continued effort.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Another interesting tidbit came out of the study. \u201cSome children were told at the start of the study that they had the ability to do really well at the task. Others were told (temporarily) that their level of ability at the task was not so high. For students with performance goals, this message made a real difference: Students who were certain of their high ability were more likely to hold on in the face of failure and remain mastery-oriented. But students who thought their ability was lower fell right into a helpless response.\u201d It made no difference to the student with learning goals.<\/p>\n<p>How are we structuring the environment in our schools and organizations? It seems to me, we foster environments that encourage and reward levels of achievement and not degrees of learning. In such a case, most people would opt out for performance goals. Who wants to take a chance of being criticized for looking dumb? Are we learning or looking good?<\/p>\n<p>Incidentally, an important book by Carol Dweck has just been released in paperback. It covers some of this material. Check out <a href=\"http:\/\/www.leadershipnow.com\/leadershop\/9780345472328.html\" target=\"_blank\"><em>Mindset: The New Psychology of Success<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n<div class=\"SPOSTARBUST-Related-Posts\"><ul class=\"entry-meta\"><li class=\"SPOSTARBUST-Related-Post\"><a title=\"Getting to Grips with Social Finance &#8211; FREE TRAINING\" href=\"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2012\/06\/12\/getting-to-grips-with-social-finance-free-training\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">Getting to Grips with Social Finance &#8211; FREE TRAINING<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"SPOSTARBUST-Related-Post\"><a title=\"Improving Employability&#8230;\" href=\"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2012\/05\/15\/improving-employability\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">Improving Employability&#8230;<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"SPOSTARBUST-Related-Post\"><a title=\"What People Say About Progress School&#8230;\" href=\"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2012\/02\/13\/what-people-say-about-progress-school\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">What People Say About Progress School&#8230;<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"SPOSTARBUST-Related-Post\"><a title=\"Some forgotten truths about enterprise&#8230;\" href=\"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2012\/02\/11\/some-forgotten-truths-about-enterprise\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">Some forgotten truths about enterprise&#8230;<\/a><\/li>\n<li class=\"SPOSTARBUST-Related-Post\"><a title=\"Leeds as a twin track city&#8230;\" href=\"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/2012\/02\/10\/leeds-as-a-twin-track-city\/\" rel=\"bookmark\">Leeds as a twin track city&#8230;<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Stanford University psychologist Carol Dweck made a great distinction between performance goals and\u00a0learning goals. Performance goals are about \u201cwinning positive\u00a0judgements\u00a0of your competence and avoiding negative ones. In other\u00a0words, when students pursue performance goals they\u2019re concerned with their level of intelligence: They want to look smart (to themselves or others) and avoid looking dumb.\u201d A person [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":40,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[32,117,147,209,214],"class_list":["post-1651","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-progress-school","tag-change","tag-learning","tag-performance-improvement","tag-training","tag-uncategorized","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1651","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1651"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1651\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/40"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1651"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1651"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/realisedevelopment.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1651"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}