10 best growth mindset activities for middle school students
Are you a middle school teacher looking for ideas about growth mindset activities for middle school students? Then this post is for you.
In this post, I have listed down 10 best growth mindset exercises for middle school students.
These activities will help your students to learn the concepts of team building, improving creativity, mindset, and expanding imagination.
Key Takeaway: Best Growth mindset activities for middle school students are Index card towers, I also, Switch sides if, Hula hoop pass, Balloon bop, Quick writes, Pair share activity, Current events worksheet, Mistakes bulletin, and Taking part in community work.
Top middle school growth mindset activities
To start the list I have first included three icebreaker activities for middle school students, rest are for mindset and team management.
1. Index card towers
Index card towers is the first activity in my list. In this activity students are divided into small groups and given blank index cards to write on. They are asked to write some message, a hobby they like the most, etc.
These index card are then shared among other group members. If two or more students write the same message or hobby then their card is used to create the index tower.
In this way the group way which have more common interests and obviously big index tower wins the game.
This activity is a great icebreaker for students just entering middle school. With this activity they learn about their fellow classmates and also get this feeling that they share so much things in common.
2. I also
This is also an icebreaker activity for middle school students to learn about their fellow batch mates. This is a very fun activity to do.
In this activity the teacher asks a question. The question can be on any general topic like: Who has visited New York in last four months?
Those students that have done that thing will say I also and line up together. You will do this activity for 5-6 minutes and after that time, the line which has more number of students will win.
3. Switch sides if
This is a similar activity to ‘I also’ but in this activity a line is drawn on the floor and all students are made to stand behind the line. Then the teacher asks a question adding “Switch sides if” statement before the original question.
Ex- Switch sides if?
- You have more than 2 siblings
- You have a dog and cat both
Those who knows that they have the things asked in the question will have to silently move to the other side of the line.
The side which will have more students at the end of the activity will be announced winner.
4. Hula hoop pass
This is a very amazing and fun activity to do. In this exercise group of 5-6 students is made in the form of a circle holding hands together.
A hula hoop is given to one random kid from the group. Then without the help of their hands, those group members have to pass the hula hoop to their next group member until it come back to the original one who started the exercise.
This is a very creative activity in which students make the most use of their brain, think creatively for finding the possible ways to pass the hula hoop.
This greatly help in developing cooperation and team management among the students.
5. Balloon bop
This is also an effective team growth mindset activity for middle schoolers.
In this activity a group of students is made to form a circle with each one holding hand of the next one in the group.
A balloon is used in this activity. Objective of the activity is to not let the balloon touch the surface.
Students can make the use of their body but not of their hands.
This activity brings great mental clarity among the middle school students. They learn how to perform in a complicated situation. Overall a very satisfying and cool activity.
6. Quick writes(brain writing)
This activity brings out the imaginative part of the kid to the class. This activity involves both teacher and students.
In this activity the teacher writes a question or some keywords on the board and give students 90 seconds to write about that topic.
Students write the answer and then teacher encourages the students to read their answers aloud one by one. The student with best answer mat also be rewarded with appreciation words from the teacher.
This activity has many benefits for the growth of a middle school student. They build up their cognitive ability, confidence, and overall mental strength.
A one more great activity for building the mindset of students of middle school. In this activity two persons are involved. A and B. A student chooses his/her partner from the class. One of them becomes A and another one becomes B.
Now A asks a question to B like tell me about Pythagoras Theorem in 90 secs. The another one, B answers the question in 90 secs time.
This is a very good activity where one uses his/her mind to recall things they learnt about. It helps improving their grades, thinking and overall personality.
8. Current events worksheet
In this activity students are asked to prepare a short note on any current happenings. They shall include its heading, what the news is about and what can we infer from that.
This news is then to be read out in the classroom.
What this activity will do?
This is a very unusual activity but a very important one for young minds. This activity will help them to remain aware of the current happenings around them and build their own perspective.
We know how important is building self-perspective for growth mindset. That’s why I included this newspaper reading activity here.
9. mistakes bulletin
Mistakes bulletin is a great growth mindset activity for middle school students. It involves making bulletins whenever student make a mistake.
This is done to recognize them that mistakes are not the setbacks but they are like blessing in disguise which a student should explore.
For this activity to be successful, you just have to encourage your students to make a mistake bulletin with mistakes in one side and what remedies they can use to correct it.
10. Taking part in community work
This is one of those activity which will have a very strong impact on the personality of the students. You can ask the students to take part in community work like plastic free world campaign, help old age people, stop pollution, don’t waste water, etc.
By this activity they will get to know about the various issues the world is facing and by actually taking part in them their communication, leadership skills will improve.
conclusion
This was the post on the best middle school growth mindset activities. I hope you have liked these activities.
If you liked these activities then do try to include them in your classes and if you already knew about these activities for middle school students then do share it with other teachers to learn.
You can also check my section on growth mindset activities. Here is the link to that : growth mindset activities.
Regards,
Sandeep.
