Feedback Strategies

(Child Playing with Blocks courtesy of Maxpixel)

Before reading the articles I would like to add that I understand where both sides are coming from in the praise versus no praise debate. I really like Carol Dweck’s opinion where one should praise the process because I have seen firsthand what happens when you just praise innate qualities and how unhelpful and damaging that is. On the other hand what you say about Alfie Kohn seems very interesting. I would say that in a perfect world praise should have no role in feedback and that you should only give feedback on what they should work on and you waste time by telling them they did good on something. Unfortunately we are not robots and everyone needs a little praise to keep them going.

The first article I read was Presence, Not Praise: How To Cultivate a Healthy Relationship with Achievement. I really liked what the author said about how if you praise a child they will think all activities are useless unless they get praise from it. That is that doing the activity is just to get praise and that the activity has no meaning at all. The example they used in that after a child finished drawing a picture they looked up at the adult for praise but instead of praise the adult simply engaged the child on what they are drawing. I think that is a better way to approach things and I will start treating any children I meet like that. In the past I know I have been guilty of jumping straight to praise if a child brings me something.

The second article I read was Criticizing (common criticisms of) praise. I really liked what Alfie Kohn said about how we use praise to impose our will on people that have less power than the praiser. Alfie also talked about how people attribute her work to mean something else than what she is saying. That is for sure true as I believed she did not like praise at all. This is wrong as she pointed out in her article that she has issues with praise that are different from what people normally attribute to her.

After reading both articles I think I have fallen back in the Carol Dweck school of thought where I think people should be praised on their effort and not their innate qualities. But as Alfie Kohn says I must not praise effort too much of else the person I am giving the praise to will think they are a loser because I am praising them simply for their effort. It definitely is a fine line to walk.