Sprint 4 - Cultural Technical

Neuroplasticity


How can understanding the benefits of Neuroplasticity be beneficial?

By understanding the principals of neuroplasticity it can be beneficial in so many different ways. Firstly it benefits people who are trying to learn a new skill or information. By understanding the principles it helps a person to learn more efficiently and effectively. It also benefits someone by aiding in recovery from brain and also physical injuries. By understanding Neuroplasticity it also helps to develop or even maintain a growth mindset as opposed to a fixed mindset due to the knowledge that the brain does in fact change and you are able to create new brain pathways and change it as you learn new things.


How can you engage the the principals of Neuroplasticity for your own benefit?

You can engage the principals of Neuroplasticity for your benefit by utilising a practice which uses the Imagination. According to research just by closing your eyes and imagining yourself practicing a certain skill or imagining moving your body a particular way can be just as effective as doing the actual skill/body movement itself. This can be beneficial as you can still practice and even progress when you are not doing the actual skill itself.


What are some of the ways to increase your neuroplasticity

One of the most effective ways of increasing your neuroplasticity is just to practice, practice, practice!


Useful Link

www.positivepsychology.com/neuroplasticity


Growth vs Fixed

Growth Mindset


Growth vs Fixed Mindset & why its relevant

The main idea behind a Growth and Fixed mindset is that everyone will predominantly have one or the other regarding various things. Whilst most people will relate with one or the other majority of the time one person can have one mindset in most aspects but can also have the opposite mindset regarding different things. This is usually different for every individual and their experiences.

People who have a fixed mindset believe that ones ability is static, they will avoid new challenges or simply give up easily. They don’t believe effort will make any difference and that it is pointless and will not yield results from effort. They also tend to feel threatened by others and will ignore any useful criticism given to them.

And in comparison a person with a Growth mindset believes that ability is and can be developed which means they will embrace new challenges and persist through tough obstacles knowing they can overcome then as opposed to just giving up. People with a growth mindset believe that effort is not only important but necessary, they learn from criticism and sometimes will even embrace the feedback in order to improve. People with a growth mindset are also inspired but others success as opposed to threatened.

This is relevant because depending on what mindset one has regarding to the specific task they are wanting to complete is most likely to be the determining factor on if they will be successful or not. It is also relevant because I believe it is quite obvious that if you want to be successful in life a Growth Mindset is more likely to help you become successful and would be the favoured mindset. Luckily if you have a fixed mindset you are able to change to a growth mindset with you guessed it effort and self work.


In this exploration, did anything surprise you? Change for you?

When I first learnt about the principles of the two different mindset the biggest thing that changed for me was the belief that I can achieve anything I want if Im willing to put in the work and I can be successful. It’s very easy to look at successful people from afar and convince yourself that they are special in some way which is what has contributed to their success when most of the time they have just been willing to put in the hard work.

Also just the huge difference that just purely believing you can do something can play a part in you actually being able to achieve it.


How will you integrate growth mindset into your learning journey?

I will integrate the Growth Mindset into my learning journey by judging my progress through my coding journey based off my effort applied and not the overall outcome. In his book “Chasing Excellence” CrossFit games winning athlete Coach talks about how instead of focusing on numbers and times he made his athletes focus on their effort given in every training session instead. He believes that using effort as a metric brings the best out of people because no one is born with talent, it's what one does with their time that counts the most! And this is almost the entire principal behind what it means to have a growth mindset.


Resources I found Engaging + Interesting