Helping students believe that they can succeed in mathematics is one of the most important things we can do. The ‘Mistakes are Good’ lesson highlights research that demonstrates how mistakes are good for learning and lead to the creation of more neural connections in the brain.
Below are lesson plans and resources to support them.
Introduction lesson
This lesson helps students to:
- Learn that when you make a mistake, your brain grows
- Appreciate that mistakes are valuable, even when they cause frustration
This lesson is designed to be run with students who are new to Maths Pathway. You can download the lesson plan here. This lesson also requires:
- Teacher video (included in this article below)
- Student video (included in this article below)
- Mistakes are Good worksheet or a blank sheet of paper for each student
- Mistakes are Good PowerPoint
- Access to a whiteboard
- (Optional) These posters printed in A4 Colour - one copy for each student
Refresh & Revise lesson
The Refresh & Revise Growth Mindset in the Classroom lesson is designed to be run with students who are familiar with Maths Pathway. You can download this lesson plan here. This lesson helps students to:
- Reflect on where they may or may not apply a growth mindset
- Unpack what growth mindset 'looks like', 'sounds like' and 'feels like'
- Reflect on their accountability to improve their own growth mindsets
The video below gives a brief overview of how this lesson should be run:
This video is the one that you will show to the students. You can either show it to them here, on YouTube, or on a PowerPoint:
We have attached a PDF of the plan for this lesson to this article. This document has links to all the resources required to run this lesson effectively.