How Not to Be a Snowplow Parent
The college bribery scandal raises the concern that overprotected young children are ill-equipped to face challenges. Here’s advice from Rachel Simmons, co-founder of Girls Leadership and the author of Enough As She Is: How to Help Girls Move Past Impossible Standards of Success to Live Healthy, Happy, and Fulfilling Lives for raising a self-sufficient child.
“The Power of Believing You Can Improve,” Carol Dweck at TEDx
Carol Dweck a pioneering researcher in the field of motivation, explains growth mindset, the idea that we can grow our brain’s capacity to learn and to solve problems. In this talk, she describes two ways to think about a problem that’s slightly too hard for you to solve. Are you not smart enough to solve […]
16 Habits of Mind (PDF)
From the Institute for Habits of Mind, whose goal is to create a more thoughtful, cooperative, compassionate generation of people who skillfully work to resolve social, environmental, economic and political problems.
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck
“One of the most influential books ever about motivation.”—Po Bronson, author of NurtureShock
How Big is My Problem? (PDF)
A great chart to help children differentiate big problems from little ones.
A Mindset for Learning by Kristi Mraz and Christine Hertz
Kristi Mraz and Christine Hertz provide practical and powerful strategies for cultivating optimism, flexibility, and empathy alongside traditional academic skills. Great lessons on teaching kids, or adults, how to become lifelong learners.
What Do You Do With a Problem? by Kobi Yamada (ages 5-10)
A story for anyone, at any age, who has ever had a problem that they wished would go away. It’s a story to inspire you to look closely at that problem and to find out why it’s here. Because you might discover something amazing about your problem…and yourself.
The Gardener and the Carpenter: What the New Science of Child Development Tells Us About the Relationship Between Parents and Children by Alison Gopnik
“Deeply researched . . . [Gopnik’s] approach focuses on helping children to find their own way . . . She describes a wide range of experiments showing that children learn less through ‘conscious and deliberate teaching’ than through watching, listening, and imitating.” ―Josie Glausiusz, Nature