Partnerships
Working on education and youth welfare Although our home base is firmly in the Frisian clay, we have built up a large network of international cooperation partners in recent years….
Growth Game
Game on the growth mindset for European primary schools
Together with educational partners from Romania, Cyprus, Estonia, and the Netherlands, we are working on a game about the growth mindset, based on the theory of the renowned psychologist Carol Dweck. The game is intended for primary education and will be used in all the involved European countries.
The Strength of the Growth Game
1
Easy to implement: both digitally and in printable format.
2
A vast collection of growth mindset challenges for primary education.
3
Cheerful (and quickly generated!) progress overviews to track advancement.
How do we give the growth mindset a boost in primary education?
A key aspect of the growth mindset is the belief that talent and intelligence are not fixed qualities (something you either “have” or “don’t have”) but can be developed through effort, dedication, and an open attitude toward learning. This benefits academic performance because when people, especially children and young individuals, believe they can grow and enhance their skills, it naturally makes more sense to put in their best effort. Moreover, it becomes much less daunting not to immediately excel at something.
According to the 2018 PISA research, only 63% of European students currently possess a growth mindset. This means that there are still many students who believe they cannot truly develop their intellect and skills, having a hindering fixed mindset. Additionally, there is often a lack of understanding of the theory behind this popular term, leading to the principles not always being applied correctly and consistently. With this partnership, we aim to bring about change in this regard!
How We Approached It
The partnership kicked off with an inventory of existing growth mindset interventions in primary education in the involved countries. What methods work well, and which ones do not? Furthermore, how familiar are teachers with the growth mindset theory at the moment? Through this research, we established the foundation for the second project outcome: a collection of effective, enjoyable, and educational challenges designed to help students internalize a growth mindset and assess and improve their own learning attitudes. This collection of tasks will form the content of the serious game, for which 8D Games is responsible.
An example of a challenge that we’ve had great experiences with is the Tower of Success. Groups of students are challenged to build the tallest tower possible using marshmallows and toothpicks. To construct a tall tower with such unwieldy materials, it’s necessary to have perseverance, maintain constructive communication, and learn from failures. These are precisely the qualities associated with a healthy learning attitude!
This is thepower-up we have achieved
After the international research, 8D Games delved into the creative concepts for the game. We presented three concepts to the partnership: a fully analog game, a hybrid form, and a strongly scenario-driven digital game. We like to approach it this way because, after all, you only know what suits best when you’ve weighed all the options! In this case, the hybrid form emerged as the winner. We are currently developing an interactive Choice Board that allows students and teachers to easily assemble a growth mindset lesson package with just a few mouse clicks. They can conveniently filter based on practical preferences, such as the length of the lesson or the number of participants.
The choice board filled with creative challenges will be available through a web-based generator in the spring of 2024. Users won’t need to download or install anything to get started. The significant advantage: convenience! After all, teachers are already busy enough.
To further facilitate the use of the Growth Game project outcomes, the partnership will also develop a user guide and an evaluation method for teachers.
Stay up to date with the latest developments? Check out the project website or follow us on Linkedin.
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This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views of the author only, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use that may be made of the information contained therein.
