We are one week in and the kids act as if they have been here forever.  It is amazing to see how comfortable they are and how easily they have adapted to the new school year.  I am encouraged by their supportive and kind words to the staff and each other. 

I overheard a child speaking to another child on the way to the cafeteria the other day.  One was inquiring as to how they would learn to buy lunch because they had always brought.  The friend responded with, “You can do it.  Every day it will get easier because you will practice and learn and then it will be no big deal.”

I have thought about this interaction several times since then.  Could it be that children actually have growth mindsets?  Do they instinctively think about and support other naturally in the way that we spend years trying to teach them to do?  Do they internally understand that they have no limits in their capacity?  If so, who created the issue of fixed minds to begin with? 

“Educational Leadership” from ASCD has an entire issue devoted to giving feedback this month.  I found the articles to leave me with my head nodding and an “of course” thought in my head.  The students do it naturally and easily.  They know how to respond to one another.  They know what to say – they don’t think too much or worry about the feedback – through empathy and understanding, they just do what comes naturally.  They speak to the behavior and the habits which help them along the way.  They don’t say, “You’re smart you can do it.”  Rather, they explain the how and why which is quite convincing. 

I think the more we foster the idea of mindset, Habits of Mind and the IB Learner Profile, the students will continue to develop and build upon what comes naturally to them.  These three guides, blended together as our school has done, provide the tools and pieces for students to turn to when looking for another way or a next step.  Often, they find meaning and value in human interactions. 

I am starting this year with interest and anticipation of the potential it holds as we foster our students’ interests, abilities and passions.   While we act as the support and the compass for students who sometimes fall of course, by cultivating the natural ways they think and interact with one another and their world, we may just see them take off and soar with the independent, confident spirits that they have had all along – like in the lunch line, telling a friend “keep practicing, you can do it.”