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The Power of Praise

Posted by kozmicstu on Monday, 19 February 2007 23:13:06

Children aren't allowed to fail any more. If a child's exam results are less than satisfactory, they haven't failed - they've simply deferred their success. Classes streamed by ability aren't suitable as some people are apparently made to feel feel inadequate by the fact that they are put in the lower groups. Teachers aren't to criticise the work given in by a child because this may cause problems with their self-esteem, and they might not try as hard next time. Some 'progressive' educational establishments have taken on the approach of giving no criticism or discipline to children at all, simply allowing them to do whatever they please without reprimand so as not to create a negative atmosphere.


Traditionally, the flip-side to this is the 'tough-love' approach, where children are shamed into achieving good results and disciplined into behaving properly. Socialists for years have screamed out against the thought that children should actually be told that they aren't doing very well, or told off when they are bad.


There is, in fact, an easy and extremely effective middle ground, and it's just starting to come out of the wood-work. The problem is, self-esteem just isn't as important as it was thought to be, and constant discipline isn't as educational as it needs to be. Children who are told that they are smart and clever start giving up and not working any more. When they do work, they only attempt things which they know they can do - they no longer put in the effort. Children who are told, however, that they have obviously put a lot of effort into a good piece of work continue to try harder and put more effort in.


It's actually quite intuitive - a child who believes that their work is good because they are smart doesn't feel the need to put effort in - they're not going to be any less smart in the future, after all. A child who believes that their work is good because they put effort in will want to put effort in again in future. There have been several studies in this area showing remarkable changes between these two situations - children who are praised for using brainpower and putting in effort, rather than just for 'being smart' and getting the right result, become more engaged, more focused and higher achieving. They also enjoy work more.


Along with this comes the problems with the habit of giving praise to children who do sub-standard work in the hope that this will motivate them in future, or at least not dissuade them. Children are actually a lot smarter than this, and rapidly begin to understand that praise means only that their work is not good enough. Sometimes this praise can counter-productively make the child feel incapable - receiving praise for a sub-standard piece of work shows that the teacher thinks you are unable to produce a higher standard of work, while receiving criticism shows that the teachers can see the potential for improvement.


I think these are the sorts of ideas that our education system needs to take on board - children should be praised for the effort that they put in rather than their 'cleverness'. They should be given praise for good work and criticism for poor work, and they should be given appropriate punishments and discipline for wrongdoings.


Mr Cameron, what approach towards education would your Conservative Party take?


I have, by the way, shamefully stolen the topic of this post from an excellent article in New York magazine, http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/index.html


Stu

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Posted by canvas on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 00:06:54

Ok gold star and then naughty step :)

Posted by scrubsupwell on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 00:29:36

I'm like that Kosmos, If I can't do something I give up. I can't spell (without a checker and a checker checker) and I can't write, but I can read but words get jumbled up, but i'm a maths wizard like my dad and a computer programing nurd. Somehow the words are right in my brain but don't translate well to paper. But I am a smart kid, that's right, confident, because kids my age are dumb, impressionable. Even though I'm special needs kids flock to me, girls adore me and I'm head of the gang.

Posted by DaveGould on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 05:12:03

It's mostly about conditioning. Karen Pryor wrote a book called Don't Shoot the Dog. It's ostensibly about training dogs but the principles are the same for human beings, especially children.

The reward/punishment has to be timed to coincide exactly with the impulse to act. Any other time and the child is unlikely to make the desired connection themselves. If you reward the impulse, this conditions the child to feel good about doing that behaviour and will do it more. If you punish the impulse, the child will feel bad about that behaviour, but will probably feel bad about you, themselves and anything else which is in the child's mind at the time. This is why punishment is a last resort.

(The rules change somewhat for anti-social adults. They have been conditioned the wrong way, usually aren't encouraged to behave well and mostly respond to punishment.)

There is a documentary that should be mandatory viewing for parents, teachers, headmasters, basically everyone in education. It's the first part of a 2 part BBC documentary called "In Search of Genius". It shows how an elderly man with no special skills turned around the worst kids in a school to become some of the best kids in a few months. The man's name is Tony Buzan and he's famous for developing a memory technique called Mind-mapping.

FWIW, I'm a clinical psychologist. It's only because the country's on a knife-edge that I bother with politics.

Posted by pamixchris on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 12:39:40

dont you know, were "all equal" now so everybody has to get an A

Posted by pamixchris on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 12:41:17

-" of course, test results cant descriminate against the less able in the subject!"

- that seems to be the view of educators

Posted by Geddes on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 16:47:23

Doing my A-levels, so hopefully my opinion and view is valued :P

Basically, whenever a teacher tells me well done, that's excellent, I feel a glow inside me, feel really happy about myself.

I see other students get told off, and as I don't want to be told off, I simply learn from other people's mistakes :) (Its all really clever :P)

But here is the best way I learn - as soon as I find out I have competition, I hate it. I have never been the top of my class, and probably never will. But, the determination to try so hard to beat by rivals is so high! Take Maths, I know someone who my maths teacher every now and then mentions to be the one who gets everything right and she on purpose pretends he got it wrong just to give other kids a go. He's my maths rival for example, and I do everything I can to beat him, giving me motivation. But I think that the problem with all this is that it drives capitalism, the right and competition very far. Also, this isn't really anything to do with 11-15 year olds :S

Posted by canvas on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 16:53:24

Geddes - just cheat ! that'll show your maths rival :) LoL hahahahahaha ONLY JOKING!

Posted by kozmicstu on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 17:02:33

"just cheat ! that'll show your maths rival"

Typical socialist suggestion...

Posted by canvas on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 17:06:35

:) fab innit?? LoL

Posted by Geddes on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 17:24:01

Cheat? Sociology? I study sociology, and I think anyone who cheats should be expelled and shamed in public. I wouldn't cheat. :P

Posted by kozmicstu on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 17:53:22

lol! Socialist! Not sociologist!

:-D

Posted by Tizzy on Tuesday, 20 February 2007 20:10:26

I've worked closely with many students on work-experience, employed teenagers with a variety of achievements and, prior to being an employer, worked for many years in tertiary education. Various close relatives have worked in primary and secondary education. For me, if I had to pick one factor that made a difference then it would be the contribution that parents consciously or subconsciously give.

Education should not be only about dry facts and figures and passing exams. It should be about discovering, development, inspiration, and application. I've seen too many young people who have been tagged as 'clever' who can't function in the real world because they have been channelled and, subsequently, blinkered. On the opposite side, some prospective employees hand over dozens of slips of coloured paper when I ask for their qualifications. These slips of paper include proof that they attended X number of classes,or that they had shown a random proficiency, or had actually handed in homework on time. These extremes are demonstration that it is not enough to leave the education of your child to teachers alone.

When working with work-experience students I try to demonstrate how the dry facts have meaning in the working world. More often than not, the penny drops and they suddenly get excited about chemistry, biology, maths etc because they can see how any of these can be applied to everyday situations.

Self-esteem, confidence, call it what you will, but inspiring children to discover that learning and application go hand in hand will stand them in good stead.

Posted by physics911comfan on Wednesday, 21 February 2007 00:21:01

united we tried to change the world

Posted by Geddes on Wednesday, 21 February 2007 16:40:57

Sorry Kozmic, me not reading properly again...

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