Despite earning only average grades, Christina
says some of her teachers constantly showered her with compliments.
“Finally you get to the point where you don’t
appreciate their compliments anymore; you just kind of ignore
them,” she says.
Some experts say parents and teachers are afraid to let kids
feel bad because it might damage their self-esteem. And so
on many playing fields, everyone makes the team. At award
ceremonies, everyone gets a ribbon. And in some schools, students
are complimented just for showing up for class.
“There’s no longer a sense of earning something,
of being able to set a goal, work for it, accomplish it and
know there are distinctions between who does a better performance
and who does a less-than-perfect performance,” says
Dr. Robert Simmermon, a psychologist.
Now a new study suggests efforts to boost self-esteem may
actually backfire. Researchers
in Boston found that students who were told how smart they
were before taking a test actually performed worse than students
who were told only to try hard.
“It has to be something when we give the praise that
is praiseworthy, because if it gets watered down it, becomes
meaningless to the child,” Dr. Simmermon says.
These days, Christina works hard at her part-time job as
an assistant cook, and she’s getting better grades in
school. What changed? She went to a new school two years ago
where she was encouraged to achieve
and praised for real accomplishments.
“They push you harder and they tell you that you can
do these things. They actually care about you. Like they make
sincere pursuits for you to do things, and they’re happy
whenever you achieve something,” Christina says.
And that, in turn, has improved her self-esteem.
“It’s kind of like having a second set of parents
here because they just push you to do better and they praise
you whenever you do really well and they’re happy when
you’re happy,” she says.
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