As generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) becomes embedded in university teaching, most conversations circle around prompts, policies and productivity: how to design assessments that resist shortcuts, or which detection tool to trust, for example. Far fewer of us are asking an equally important question: what are students’ mindsets around AI-supported learning?
In her research on motivation and learning, psychologist Carol Dweck distinguishes between two types of mindset:
- A growth mindset, characterised by the belief that intelligence and skill can be developed through effort, strategy and feedback
- A fixed mindset, characterised by the belief that ability is a fixed trait, something you either have, or you don’t.
Dweck’s distinction offers a useful lens for understanding and supporting how students engage with AI.
So how do these concepts apply to AI?
Students with a fixed mindset may avoid AI because they fear failure or feel intimidated by the technology. Others may over-rely on it, using it to bypass productive struggle rather than develop skills. In both cases, the learning process becomes passive. These behaviours align with a fixed mindset in that they avoid challenges and failures to “look” intelligent or see effort as fruitless.
If students can approach AI with a growth mindset, they may engage with it to develop skills, explore ideas, request feedback and test strategies with curiosity rather than fear.
Recent research supports this distinction. One study on AI-assisted learning environments found that access to AI alone does not automatically increase learner autonomy, suggesting that students still need explicit support to develop reflective and growth-oriented learning habits. Another advocates for growth mindset interventions that support psychological readiness for effective adoption of GenAI. Here’s what you can do in the classroom.
1. Be clear about what AI is and how students should work with it
Students need to know that AI should not replace effort but that it should help make their efforts more effective. Teachers can do this by sharing key takeaways from Dweck’s research about growth mindset, such as that:
- intelligence and skill grow through embracing challenges
- we should treat effort as the path to mastery
- mistakes and feedback are information rather than verdicts on ability.
A short, concrete example helps make the ideas tangible. I use Khan Academy’s YouTube video on neuroplasticity, which explains how the brain strengthens physically through practice.
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2. Position AI as a feedback partner, not an answer machine
This is especially useful for students in English for academic purposes (EAP) courses, who often turn to AI for language support. Rather than asking a chatbot to fix or to do the work for them, students can be trained to prompt it for targeted feedback. Here are prompts to share with students:
- Read this paragraph and tell me one strength, one weakness and one way to improve that cohesion. Do not rewrite the whole paragraph for me.
- Identify three grammar issues in this paragraph. Explain each issue using simple language, show the correction and give me one new sentence to use to practise the grammar rule.
- Rewrite this paragraph at the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) levels of B1, B2 and B2+. Then explain the differences in vocabulary, grammar, cohesion and academic style.
3. Teach students to practise using AI to develop their knowledge
To foster a growth mindset, students must use AI to strengthen their weaknesses. This means using it to react to an instructor’s feedback. Example prompts include:
- Feedback for my English for academic purposes work highlights issues with the use of articles “a”, “an” and “the”. Create 10 practice sentences based on the mistakes I made in my draft. Provide answers after I complete the exercise.
- I need to improve my use of hedging language. Give me eight sentences to rewrite in a more academic style using words such as “may”, “might”, “suggests”, “appears” and “could”.
- Based on my first and revised draft, tell me what improved. Then ask me two questions that prompt reflection on the learning process.
4. Moving from passive to informed AI use
Reflection helps students become aware of how they are using AI. This can help them refine their higher-order thinking and application of their feelings, context and insights into the learning process. One simple approach is to have students ask the AI to summarise their use of it at the end of a session:
They could use the prompt:
Review our conversation and briefly summarise in clear, simple language:
- how I used AI
- what AI helped me understand or improve
- what ideas or decisions came from me
- what areas I could improve on.
Do not invent information that is not included in the conversation.
The end summary helps students develop metacognition, because they are not just completing a task, but they are thinking about how they learn and whether their use of AI was responsible and effective.
Instructors who build a custom chatbot for their course (for example, a custom GPT) can directly embed this type of function when prompting. During setup, the instructor writes the summary instructions into the chatbot’s configuration and includes resources to recommend, such as office hours or a link to the university’s writing centre. Once that groundwork is in place, a student can simply type a phrase such as “end summary” at the close of a conversation, and the chatbot will automatically:
- assess the student’s use of AI during the exercise
- provide tips or areas for students to focus on
- point the student towards relevant support.
As educators continue to integrate AI in teaching and learning, they must foster a growth mindset in students to prevent them from using AI tools as shortcuts. When students learn to use it as a reflective learning partner, AI can support resilience, experimentation and long-term academic success.
By Ana Li Zhong is a language lecturer at Xi’an Jiaotong University in China.
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