What If STEM Challenges Are Just Puzzles in Disguise?
Pause for a moment and think back to the last time a differential‑equation proof sent your heart rate soaring. Did your brain whisper, “I’m not wired for this”? Curiously, psychologists such as Carol Dweck have shown that students who treat ability as stretchable outperform those who see talent as fixed. Why might that be? Perhaps the very act of believing in elastic intelligence nudges us to search for alternate routes when the first shortcut fails. Try an experiment: swap the resigned statement “I can’t do vector calculus” with the provisional “I haven’t seen this vector calculus route yet.” Next, design a SMART goal—Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, Time‑bound—to test whether attitude alters outcome. For instance: “By Sunday night, I will solve 15 grad‑div‑curl practice problems and check accuracy against the solution set.” Post that goal somewhere you can’t ignore (laptop lid, phone wallpaper, even a sticky note on your kettle). When a quiz returns splashed with red i...