<p>Everyone making the team is expensive. recreation league teams are staffed by volunteers making the community dependent on finding those volunteers, and school teams have to cut people unless they have money for extra uniforms and asst coaches.</p>
<p>My daughter played on middle school teams where no one was cut. Partially this was due to a small team and everyone was needed, but it was also due to a philosophy that desire was important and this was middle school not pro ball. They didn’t have as some middle schools did, a 6th grade team and team A & B. Only one coach, with a volunteer parent as asst coach and one team. This team from a middle school of less than 300 students ended up playing A teams from schools of 1400. This was tough, these other schools had girls who often also played “select soccer”, had matching jackets to their sports bags and parents who made fun of our schools losing record.
Our girls had a great attitude, and were great players some of whom went on to play in high school. My daughter doesn’t play for her high school team, didn’t even try out, but she does play for the recreation league and enjoys the game. We should encourage more kids to play a team sport, whether they go to the playoffs or not. We have been very fortunate to have coaches who valued the girls learning and loving the game more than getting to first place. While her school team was last in division, her rec league team ( Again no try outs) was first in city last year, and was bumped up to new division. My daughter has learned a lot from the game and from herself by playing. If she had been on a team, that cut, she wouldn’t have had that opportunity.</p>
<p>Jmmom’s story resonates with me. I disliked the then-new now-gone principal at D’s elementary school who came in when D was halfway through. On one hand she invented all sorts of Mickey Mouse awards so that everyone could get one…her thinking was as if self-esteem was something that could be sprayed on externally. Otoh, she hates anything, such as National Merit awards (she’s now a vice-principal at the high school), where kids can feel bad that they didn’t get the award.</p>
<p>CharlesIves, the only bone I’d pick with the Calc teacher is that if the students are doing well enough to get 5’s, they should also be getting A’s. In <em>most</em> cases, a C in the class and a 5 on the test shouldn’t correlate. I’m all for rigor and high expectations. But.</p>
<p>Hm. I live in a Lake Wobegon community too, but I’ve never seen the kind of effusive over-praising we’re talking about on this thread, though I have heard it referred to in political discussions. When I used to help once a week at my kids’ elementary school, I’d observe a teacher give no feedback for an incorrect answer and continue to look around the classroom for the correct response, or else give a straightforward “No - anyone else?” I felt this was a good technique because the kid with the incorrect answer didn’t feel pounded into the floor, as often happened in my elementary school days (or have his/her head pounded into the blackboard, as happened during my father’s parochial school days). </p>
<p>I don’t see anything wrong with participation ribbons and an honest, “Nice try.” Overpraising is silly. but excessive criticism is certainly worse.</p>
<p>How does this perceived epidemic of self-esteem, regardless of achievement or ability, and reward for simple participation mesh with the widespread concern about too much pressuring of kids to get high grades and be the best at everything? It seems like these are opposite approaches to parenting, so how can our whole society be guilty of both?</p>
<p>The “perceived epidemic of self-esteem” (well put) is in my opinion largely a phony construct composed of exagerrated anecdotal “evidence” and sweeping generalizations which resonate with a political agenda. Teenhood is just as brutal now as it was when I was in high school. The kids are hard on themselves and hard on each other. Anyone who isn’t aware of that is clueless. Giving 6 year olds participation “trophies” is harmless. By the time they leave high school they’ll have gotten their share of blows to their “self esteem”.</p>
<p>Motheroftwo - I wonder if these two “opposing” epidemics are imposed on our kids somewhat serially - first x years = praise for every little thing, next x years = pressure to be the best? This explanation would fit with kluge’s observation in the post directly ffing yours.</p>
<p>Thedad posted, “the only bone I’d pick with the Calc teacher is that if the students are doing well enough to get 5’s, they should also be getting A’s. In <em>most</em> cases, a C in the class and a 5 on the test shouldn’t correlate. I’m all for rigor and high expectations. But.”</p>
<p>But that is the point. In Mr Russinello’s class a C and a 5 on the AP test do correlate because he demands absolute excellence for that A. His tests are chock full of questions that demand absolute understanding of material in a form they have never seen before. A few students exhibit that excellence and get A’s, more show very good understanding and get B’s, and a few more show average understanding and are rewarded with C’s because in Mr Russ’s book average=C. However every average student will get a minimum of 3 on the AP test.</p>
<p>And the amazing thing is that his students love him!!! Look at the comments on the link I posted. They know that in most cases they will get A’s with less than excellence. But not with Mr Russ and they appreciate that because as many noted in the link, he is preparing them for life. I find that to be a much more mature attitude that stories of students and parents running to a teacher daring to give their student less than an A. And the parents in our district know what to expect with Mr Russ too and wouldn’t trade him for any other teacher in the world.</p>
<p>Like I said, when I asked my son how his calc class at Oberlin was, his comment was pfft. The tests are so much easier than Mr Russ’s. And with all the questioning about the rigor of HS AP classes, isn’t this a bit refreshing?</p>
<p>“Moral of the story: we need to teach our kids where self-esteem really comes from. It is NOT from constant praise, choosing pursuits where one will always shine. It is from accomplishing something in which effort was required.”</p>
<p>I completely agree with jamimom. I think I’d like to take that off on a tangent, though. Self-esteem has to come from the inside. YOU have to know that YOU are worthwhile, YOUR ideas are worthwhile etc… or all the external praise means nothing. Because eventually, you have to grow up and face a world without participation ribbons. You have to have a sense of your own self-worth and your own motivation, or when that praise is taken away, you are worthless.</p>
<p>I can’t get into specifics, but I know college students with serious self-esteem problem–I am a tutor. At that point, they don’t even try, so they don’t ever get anywhere. Any praise I offer may help for a minute, but it means little if I ever, however positively, critique anything. So there has to be some balance–I can’t just flat out say, “This is bad,” even if it is, because then they just freeze. So I have to be gentle, or we will accomplish nothing.</p>
<p>That is a great question. I think part of the issue raised above is when generic false praise is given (the earlier example of “nice job walking up to hit”) … this does not really improve confidence and eventually is seen through by the kids. The challenge is connecting to each kid and finding legitimate things to praise of their effort … it can be done but it requires thinking about each child as an individual.</p>
<p>My kid’s school has “Good News Assemblies” for the real young kids … every 3rd or 4th assembly each kid gets an award. My first reaction to the assemblies was another attempt by the liberals (hey I’m one of them so I can rag on them) to make everyone feel good by giving away the equivelent of particiaption certificates. But it is so much better than that … every kid has challenges and virtually all of them are trying hard to improve and are making progress … so when someone reads their first chapter book, or goes a week without getting disciplined, or figures out their multiplication tables they get a Good News Award … and they are written in such a positive and encouraging way that unless you know the child you don’t realize the underlying issue driving the awards … it is really a terrific event. </p>
<p>The punchline is to not measure kids against each other … but help them grow and move forward … tracking their improvement over time … with this viewpoint legitimate praise can be given to everyone.</p>
<p>This thread addresses the various aspects of praise for children, but what do you do for adults that seem to need and feed on praise - particularly praise for their children that borders on adoration? I suppose it is part of the “pressuring” question that 3togo posed. We have had to learn to deal over the years with a family friend that needs for her kids to be in the limelight and be the award winners in every activity they participate in. It’s to the point that she feels that something is unfair or “rigged” if her kids don’t win. (Or it was just a stupid award anyway.) I often catch her inflating the facts where her children are concerned. Their grades, class rank, outcome on standardized tests, etc. I keep my mouth shut, but over the years, I have learned to come in and set the tone of the conversation early - thus eliminating the inflated stories. The problem is that now her children often lie to her. They make up stories that are in turn inflated accounts of a very nice, but small compliment from a teacher. She would ask how my kids were doing, then grill her kids and come back and report to me that hers were doing better. Running the mile in less time although my daughter knew better. Coaches and even asst. principals begging her kids to joint the track team because no one was faster. It just goes on and on. I have never ratted out her kids in a lie because they’re already exhausted from working to keep her off their backs and they have a hard time making friends because she has made them so competitive and is constantly in the background. They have learned that it is easier to tell her what she wants to hear - even if it is a fabrication. The oldest is breaking away somewhat and I work with her on his behalf to get her to loosen up, but the problems of having a praise hungry mom are hard to overcome. I often attribute a lot of this to the fact that she is from another country and the opportunities afforded to her as a young girl were somewhere between zero and none. She is a really great person in other ways, but when she’s in brag mode, I have to step away. </p>
<p>I just hope that we haven’t created a generation of praise and adoration junkees. We don’t need them to turn in to this kind of parentl </p>
<p>As a side note, I think you can praise your kids for putting in a good effort - but I think you need to discuss the results with a liberal amount of reality. If they win, awesome. If they did well for the amount of time they put in, that’s fine too. But if the kids that placed ahead of them did so because they worked harder, that should be discussed. Particularly if your child seems disappointed. Often, we discuss competitions in terms of trade offs and life style balance. Do you want to give up activity A in order to further excel in activity B. If not, so be it. The kids that won were. No dishonor, just fact. We are also quick in our house to recognize talents in other students. My kids enjoy having friends with various talents, and we have enjoyed watching them through the years.</p>
<p>Well said jmmom and tanstaafl: self esteem comes from the self, and parental esteem, when reduced to “good job” type comments can subvert it. I’ve commented from time to time on the “praise inflation” so evident to anyone who reads a few hundred letters of recommendation. Right up there with grade inflation these days.</p>
<p>Allow me to introduce another idea: many of the truly accomplished people I know, people who accomplish significant things, are not long on self-esteem; searing self-criticism, deep unsatisfaction with themselves and their works, an unbearable-seeming sense of inadequacy seems more like it.</p>
<p>(I am trying to keep my # of posts down, as yemaya has pointed out on another thread that my addiction is showing. But when a Truth is spoken, I just can’t stop myself from applauding).</p>
<p>I agree with the posts about achievement–> self-esteem. It seems as though a lot of grade schools have been guilty of smothering kids with tokens of praise for seemingly inconsequential things. Our grade school took it one step futher by giving the kids candy or rewarding them with videos in the classroom if they met expectations. So, besides rewarding kids for superfluous reasons, I think their school exposed the students to poor health choices. It would be interesting to see if kids who were rewarded with treats and videos succumbed to the obesity epidemic we hear about. Most kids will do just about anything to get to dip their hand in the candy jar. It’s my feeling that kids should be motivated to do something because it’s right, not because they get extra Tootsie Rolls.</p>