75 Awesome Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids

growth mindset quotes

These growth mindset quotes aren’t just great for kids, they’re perfect for your homeschool, too!

Teaching kids how to develop a growth mindset has been a hot topic in the field of education for many years now.

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Since the release of the book, Mindset, by Carol Dweck in 2006, educators of all types – public, private, and homeschool – have been trying to teach their students how to have a growth mindset.

In this article, we’ll go over:

  • What is a growth mindset?
  • The difference between a growth mindset and a fixed mindset
  • 75 growth mindset quotes that demonstrate the qualities and principles of a growth mindset

We’ve also go a really cool free download ready for you in our Free Resource Library: Growth Mindset Bookmarks for Your Kids to Color!

Keep on reading to check it all out!

What is a growth mindset?

According to Carol Dweck, writing for the Harvard Business Review, having a growth mindset can be described this way:

Individuals who believe their talents can be developed (through hard work, good strategies, and input from others) have a growth mindset. They tend to achieve more than those with a more fixed mindset (those who believe their talents are innate gifts). This is because they worry less about looking smart and they put more energy into learning.

Basically, individuals with a growth mindset believe that their abilities can be developed with hard work over time.

Growth mindset-oriented people know that talent and intelligence are only starting points on the path towards achievement.

Those with a growth mindset tend to be more resilient because they do not see failure as a reason to give up, but rather as an opportunity to learn and try again.

What is a fixed mindset?

On the flip side of the growth mindset coin is the fixed mindset.

People who have a fixed mindset tend to believe that their talents and strengths are static throughout life. For example, people with fixed mindsets often believe or make the statements like these:

  • I’m naturally intelligent, athletic, etc.
  • You are so talented – that’s why you don’t need to practice
  • I am just not made with a brain for math
  • You’re a natural-born swimmer, dancer, math whiz, etc.
  • I’m no good at reading

Individuals with a fixed mindset have a much harder time handling failure because they tend to view it as a reflection of their character.

Fixed mindset-oriented people are much less resilient and have a tendency to give up when faced with obstacles.

Growth mindset quotes for kids

The following quotes by world-famous thinkers, celebrities, athletes, and more are perfect illustrations of a growth mindset.

Read through the entire list and choose your favorites to share with your kids, or you could read a few at a time instead.

1.“You have not failed unless you have quit trying.” – Gordon B. Hinckley

2. “Love challenges, be intrigued by mistakes, enjoy effort, and keep on learning.” –  Carol Dweck

3. “Believe you can and you’re halfway there.” – Theodore Roosevelt

4. “Always do what you are afraid of doing.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

5. “Most of the important things in the world have been accomplished by people who have kept on trying when there seemed no hope at all.” 

6. “You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” – Wayne Gretzky

7. “It does not matter how slowly you go so long as you do not stop.” – Confucius

growth mindset quote

8. “All things are difficult before they are easy.” – Thomas Fuller

9. “If you find a path with no obstacles, it probably doesn’t lead anywhere.” – Frank A. Clark

10. “In the middle of difficulty lies opportunity.” Albert Einstein

Related post: Growth Mindset – 5 Great Ways to Teach It In Your Homeschool

11. “Nothing is impossible. The word itself says ‘I’m possible!’” – Audrey Hepburn

12. “I can accept failure, everyone fails at something. But I can’t accept not trying.” – Michael Jordan

13. “Challenges are what make life interesting. Overcoming them is what makes life meaningful.” – Joshua J. Marine

14. “May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.” – Nelson Mandela

nelson mandela quote

15. “Failure is so important. We speak about success all the time. It is the ability to resist failure or use failure that often leads to greater success.” – J.K. Rowling

16. “Our greatest glory is not in never failing, but in rising every time we fail.” – Confucius

17. “Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you did not do than by the ones you did.” – Mark Twain

18. “Whether you think you can or you think you can’t, you’re right.” – Henry Ford

19. “Life is 10% what happens to you and 90% how you react to it.” – Charles Swindoll

20. “I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.” – Thomas A. Edison

21. “The greatest mistake you can make in life is to be continually fearing you will make a mistake.” – Elbert Hubbard

growth mindset quote 3

22. “It’s not whether you get knocked down, it’s whether you get back up.” – Vince Lombardi

23. “Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really. Double your rate of failure.” – Thomas Watson

24. “There is a difference between not knowing and not knowing yet.” – Sheila Tobias

25. “Education is not the learning of facts, but the training of the mind to think.” – Albert Einstein

26. “The problem human beings face is not that we aim too high and fail, but that we aim too low and succeed.” – Michelangelo

Free Printable Growth Mindset Bookmarks

To help infuse more growth mindset in your homeschool, be sure to download and print the free growth mindset printable bookmarks from The Reluctant Homeschool Mama’s Resource Library!

growth mindset printable bookmarks

Print out the bookmarks, give them a trim, and let your kids color them while you discuss some of these great growth mindset quotes for kids below!

More growth mindset quotes

27. “Don’t worry about failure. Worry about the chances you miss when you don’t even try.” – Sherman Finesilver

28. “Hard work beats talent when talent fails to work hard.” – Kevin Durant

hard work quote

29. “Why fit in when you were born to stand out?” – Dr. Seuss

30. “Test scores and measures of achievement tell you where a student is, but they don’t tell you where a student could end up.” – Carol Dweck

31. “Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.” –Maria Robinson

32. “Patience, persistence, and perspiration make an unbeatable combination for success.” – Napoleon Hill

33. “The thought ‘I can’t’ is a lie. We use it to excuse ourselves from trying.” – Darren Hardy

34. “Genius is one percent inspiration and ninety-nine percent perspiration.” – Thomas Edison

35. “If at first, you don’t succeed, you’re normal.” – Kid President

kid president quote

36. “Knowing is not enough; we must apply. Willing is not enough; we must do.” – Johann von Goethe

37. “Everything is figureoutable.” – Marie Forleo

38. “The very best thing you can do for the whole world is to make the most of yourself.” – Wallace Wattles

 39. “After every game or practice, if you walk off the field knowing that you gave everything you had, you will always be a winner.” – Mia Hamm

40. “Failure is not the outcome, failure is not trying.” – Sara Blakely

41. “There will always be rocks in the road ahead of us. They will be stumbling blocks or stepping stones; it all depends on how you use them.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

42. “DNA has nothing to do with success. Turn your genes into overalls and get to work.” – Darren Hardy

darren hardy quote

44. “When you close the door of your mind to negative thoughts, the door of opportunity opens to you.” – Napoleon Hill

44. “Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.” – Thomas A. Edison

45. “Success is the sum of small efforts, repeated day in and day out.” – Robert Collier

46. “Life is about being and becoming, not having and getting.” – Stephanie Seabrook Hedgepath

47. “With effort, talent becomes skill and, at the very same time, effort makes skill productive.” – Angela Duckworth

48. “If you don’t give anything, don’t expect anything. Success is not coming to you; you must come to it.” – Marva Collins

49. “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” – Lao Tzu

growth mindset quote 7

50. “Don’t tell me how talented you are. Tell me how hard you work.” – Arthur Rubenstein

51. “There will always be rocks in the road ahead of us. They will be stumbling blocks or stepping stones; it all depends on how you use them.” – Friedrich Nietzsche

52. “You may have to fight a battle more than once in order to win it.”– Margaret Thatcher

53. “Great works are performed, not by strength, but by perseverance.” – Samuel Johnson

54. “Don’t let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.” – John Wooden

55. “The only thing that overcomes hard luck is hard work.” – Harry Golden

56. “Dreams don’t work unless you do.” – John C. Maxwell

dreams don't work quote

57. “I don’t run away from a challenge because I am afraid. Instead, I run toward it because the only way to escape fear is to trample it beneath your feet.” – Nadia Comaneci

58. “When we give ourselves permission to fail, we, at the same time, give ourselves permission to excel.” – Eloise Ristad

59. “Life isn’t about waiting for the storm to pass…It’s about learning to dance in the rain.” – Vivian Greene

Related post: 59 Inspirational Homeschool Quotes That All Homeschool Moms Need to Read

60. “The only real mistake is the one from which we learn nothing.” – Henry Ford

61. “A challenge only becomes an obstacle when you bow to it.” – Ray Davis

62. “Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm.” – Winston Churchill

63. “Once your mindset changes, everything on the outside will change along with it.” – Steve Maraboli

growth mindset quote 9

64. “Don’t ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you come alive and go do it. Because what the world needs is people who have come alive.” – Howard Thurman

65. “Inside of every problem lies an opportunity.” – Robert Kiposaki

66. “The passion for stretching yourself and sticking to it, even (or especially) when it’s not going well, is the hallmark of the growth mindset.” – Carol Dweck

67. “Success is not final; failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.” – attributed to Winston Churchill 

68. “Only those who dare to fail greatly can ever achieve greatly.” – Robert F. Kennedy

69. “There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.” – Paulo Coelho

70. “It’s not how far you fall, but how high you bounce that counts.” – Zig Ziglar

zig ziglar quote

71. “When the negative thoughts come – and they will; they come to all of us – it’s not enough to just not dwell on it… You’ve got to replace it with a positive thought.” – Joel Osteen

72. “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.”– Walt Disney

73. “Every adversity, every failure, every heartache carries with it the seed of an equal or greater benefit.” – Napoleon Hill

74. “Change your thoughts and you change your world.” – Norman Vincent Peale

75. “You’re in charge of your mind. You can help it grow by using it in the right way.” Carol Dweck

Further reading suggestions

For more in-depth reading about growth mindset, these two books are the absolute best places to start:

Mindset: The New Psychology of Success by Carol Dweck

Grit: The Power of Passion and Perseverance by Angela Duckworth

Final thoughts about these growth mindset quotes for kids:

We hope you’ve enjoyed these growth mindset quotes for kids and that you’ll find them useful in your homeschool!

Developing a growth mindset definitely takes time and practice, so these quotes are here to reinforce and help whenever you need them.

Before you go, don’t forget to snag the free growth mindset coloring bookmarks for your kids!

Related articles about homeschooling and growth mindset:

How to Easily Create a Fabulous Homeschool Library

Dealing With Homeschool Burnout? You Need These 7 Great Tips!

Pin the image below to easily return to this article in the future!

growth mindset quotes for kids

Which of these growth mindset quotes for kids resonates most with you?

 75 Awesome Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids 75 Awesome Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids 75 Awesome Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids 75 Awesome Growth Mindset Quotes for Kids

Hi there! I’m so glad you’re here! I’m Jen, a former reluctant homeschool mom who is ready to help you actually enjoy homeschooling too. Read more here…

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