First Days and Growth Mindset

I gave my classes a paper structure challenge last week. I heard words like "impossible" and "confusing" and "fail", but I also heard words like "fun" and "magic". I took the idea for the lesson from a post by Tim Bowman with the intention of letting student groups struggle. It's easy to link the idea of struggling to science because that's what science is all about. Trying something, collecting data, seeing if your idea works. When I heard the word "fail" I said "Don't use the F word!" because it's all learning! If something doesn't work, you (probably) won't do it again the same way again. We learn from mistakes and it's important to work through the struggle. Add a "yet" to the end of that statment.

I also had my 6th period class try their hands at the Cup Stacking Challenge. We ended with a silent challenge and my cheeks were sore from smiling and laughing so much. They did an outstanding job!