How to Use Prodigy to Promote a Growth Mindset in Your Child
With kids spending more time at home and virtual learning becoming more important than ever this school year, parents like you probably want to keep their children motivated and self-reliant when it comes to learning.
While you’re helping your child learn from home, promote a growth mindset to help them become a lifelong learner. Not only will their learning skills improve, but they’ll actually enjoy learning more.
We’ll show you how to use Prodigy to promote a growth mindset in your child, preparing them to learn and achieve more throughout the year!
The 2 best ways Prodigy can promote a growth mindset
Not sure what a "growth mindset" is? Skip to this section for a simple definition and some examples.
A common concern for many parents like you is how they can make sure their child continues to build a growth mindset.
That's where Prodigy Math Game can help, since it's proven to boost learning outcomes and math achievement!
This is because the more your child plays Prodigy, the more our adaptive algorithm adjusts to their individual learning needs. And all this helps them grow and learn in an engaging and fun way, instead of feeling frustrated or math anxious.
Prodigy offers every child a personalized learning experience. Your child will receive standards-aligned questions tailored to their exact learning strengths and needs, and can progress through these questions at their own pace. This helps ensure they stay motivated to keep learning and growing.
So, the best way to use Prodigy to promote a growth mindset? Encourage your child to play!
Here are the two best ways to encourage more math practice in Prodigy:
1. Set Goals, send Rewards
Give your child new Goals and Rewards to keep them motivated to learn!
Goals are a valuable Premium tool that helps encourage your child to answer more math questions. Instead of feeling discouraged when they get questions wrong, they’ll be invested in completing their Goal and want to keep trying!
Watch this one-minute video on how to set Goals (and send Rewards)!
Choose any Premium Membership package to set a Goal in your parent account and motivate your child today!
When your child completes a Goal, you’ll be prompted to send them an in-game Reward for all their hard work! Select Send a Reward in the Goal overview section of your dashboard and they’ll receive an awesome in-game prize.
2. Motivate them more with extra Premium Membership benefits!
Premium Memberships are the easiest and quickest way to level up engagement and inspire your child to improve their math skills!
Prodigy's Premium Memberships feature unlocked exclusive in-game benefits — from new Epics to pet evolutions to members-only items and game areas, plus so much more!
This empowers your child to:
- Master more math skills
- Spend more time practicing math
- Answer more curriculum-aligned math questions
And at no extra cost, you'll also unlock access to tons more parent features, like:
- Cheer Them On — Send your child encouraging messages they'll receive in the game.
- Practice Areas — See sample questions of the skills your child practiced and where they need extra help.
- Practice Sheets — Support your child with custom worksheets that make homework time fun.
More practice = more confidence
Whether your child is learning remotely, in the classroom or a bit of both, the more you empower your child to play Prodigy, the more they’ll realize, with practice and effort, they can achieve learning goals and get better at math. All while having lots of fun!
When you have the tools to track and support your child’s learning, you can encourage them to feel confident in their math skills — and that makes all the difference.
Growth mindset definition
First, let’s talk about what it means to have a growth mindset.
The concept, which has become increasingly important to teachers in their classrooms, was first popularized by Stanford University Professor Carol Dweck.
Dweck argues that the way students perceive their ability to learn falls somewhere between a fixed and growth mindset.
Below are some examples of what a student on either side of the spectrum might believe about themselves.
If a student has a fixed mindset, they might believe:
- Their abilities are fixed traits
- Their achievement comes from natural intelligence or talent
- If they fail, it's because they're not good at the subject
If a student has a growth mindset, they might believe:
- Their abilities are able to develop with time, experience and effort
- Their achievement comes from hard work and trying new learning methods
- If they fail, it's because they need to learn more and try harder next time
Source: Annie Spratt via Unsplash
To develop a growth mindset, students must understand they’re not just “born smart.” Instead, their efforts and actions can impact their growth.
And it’s true! Research shows growth mindsets keep students intrinsically motivated to put effort into school work and positively affect educational performance. This intrinsic motivation impacts how we think and, ultimately, our overall growth.
How to teach kids about growth mindsets
Want to help your child understand what it means to have a growth mindset? Try these three tips:
1. Teach them how it works
Tell your child all about how their brain makes new connections every time they learn. When they realize effort actually helps their brains grow so they can achieve more, they might be more willing to try!
Tip: Show your child how neural connections work with something concrete to help them understand, like drawing or using LEGO.
Or try using printables, like this one from Big Life Journal!
2. Model growth mindset thinking
Model a growth mindset in your own daily life and encourage your child to follow your example.
One way you can do this is to promote the power of YET in your household. Kids will notice this simple change in language more than you’d think!
If a task frustrates you, for example, replace “I can’t do this” with “I can’t do this yet.” This shows your child that you believe you can achieve things with effort and persistence.
Tip: try putting this poster from TidyLady Printables up in your home!
3. Help them create SMART goals
Work with your child to create realistic goals for improvement. This will give them an idea of where to focus their efforts, so they can work toward positive growth!
To be SMART, the goal must be:
- Strategic — Target a specific area you want to improve. Think about exactly what you want to accomplish and why.
- Measurable — Make sure you can measure your progress and specify how.
- Achievable/Attainable — Make your goal realistic, so you can take steps to reach it. Don’t make it too easy or too difficult.
- Relevant — Ask whether the goal is relevant to what you want to accomplish. If your goals is to improve a specific skill, it must be relevant to a certain area.
- Timely/Time-bound — Set a timeline for when you’d like to achieve your goal.
For example, a SMART goal your child makes might look like this:
By the end of the month, I will be able to round two-digit numbers to the nearest 10th without hints, getting the correct answer at least 9 out of 10 times.
Tip: use this printable from Apples and Bananas Education to help your child keep their goals SMART!
You play the most important role in your child's life and we hope these three tips help you to support their growth mindset — today, tomorrow and in the years to come.
