The A Level Mindset
The A Level Mindset programme identifies common practices which lead to success at A level and asserts that these five elements can be learned.
The acronym 'VESPA' is used as a simple way to remember each aspect.
V = Vision
How well do you know what you want to achieve?
E = Effort
How many hours of independent work do you do per week?
S = Systems
How do you organise your learning and time?
P = Practice
What kind of work do you do to practise your skills?
A = Attitude
How do you respond to setbacks?
That’s it. It looks pretty simple in those terms, but it’s the distillation of years of careful observations! As you think about your answers, you’ll perhaps already start to see where you feel strong, and where you need to improve.
If success is an equation, by the way, the equation isn’t this:
V + E + S + P + A = success.
It’s this:
V x E x S x P x A = success.
Research has shown that teaching students these five skills, results in more and more students get better and better grades. Students outperform most other students in the country. Students get into better universities and get better jobs. Our students aren’t any more intelligent than the students that came before them. Instead, they have begun to learn a series of behaviours and thought processes that help them to succeed.