Earn Self-Esteem?

Recently I stumbled upon an article in the NY magazine from 2007 titled "How Not to Talk to Your Kids-the Inverse Power of Praise."  I have several unread magazines just waiting for my attention, some dating several years before this one.  This article caught my attention since I work with a lot of children and parents.  There is an online version of this particular article.   http://nymag.com/news/features/27840/index3.html .

The intention of this piece is to educate parents that some research indicates telling kids that they are smart may be one of the worst things one can do.  The article begins with the story of Thomas.  Thomas is the brightest of the brightest.  His IQ tests in a very high range.  Not only was he smart, but he was also aware he was smart and often told he was smart.  This intelligence didn't lead to "a fearless confidence" in all areas of academics. He struggled considerably with some areas of academics such as spelling, fractions and he outright struggled with cursive.

The author infers that Thomas had divided the world into things he was good at and things he wasn't.  He would not try those that he wasn't good at and according to the author many gifted students often underestimate their own abilities.

So here is a case in which the child is reminded often just how "smart" he is, his test scores indicate that he is smart, yet he struggles in school and lacks self-confidence.

The article quotes a survey in which 85% of American parents think it is important to tell their kids they are smart. The article also mentions several studies are demonstrating that this is NOT the way to build self-esteem.   Telling your child they are smart DOES NOT build self-confidence or self-esteem.

The piece highlight the work of Dr. Carol Dweck.   The take home message of her work: reward the process not the result and teach children that the brain can and does grow with hard work.  When we emphasize effort and process gives them the understanding that they are in control.  When we emphasize natural intelligence or ability we take the control away from the child and we do not give them the ability to cope with failure.

I myself have run into this in practice.  Children ARE incredibly intelligent and aware. I have a few times experienced a child in tears.  They express frustration, they feel something is WRONG with them....after all "mom and dad always tell me how smart I am, yet some tasks (like reading) are just way too hard."

We can see evidence of this in the real world.  Micheal Jordan for example had raw talent, but he didn't become "Micheal Jordan" without a considerable amount of work.   When Micheal Jordan was a sophomore he did not make the varsity squad.  He took this as a challenge to prove his worth.  He then became a talented collegiate athlete however he was not drafted 1st in 1984.  Some people look back at the 1984 draft and laugh at the concept of Sam Bowie being drafted ahead of him.  Michael Jordan however wasn't "Michael Jordan."  He used his talent combined with deliberate practice.  He responded to failure and what made him Micheal Jordan was the way he reacted to the setbacks and challenges.  He became ever more talented.

Malcolm Gladwell devotes an entire chapter of his book Outliers to the concept of deliberate practice.  In the chapter ''The 10,000-Hour Rule" Gladwell discusses how when psychologists look at the careers of the gifted the smaller the role innate talent seems to play and the bigger the role preparation seems to play.  Geniuses do not start out that way (as geniuses).   Mozart, Bill Gates, The Beatles and many others dealt with failure and used deliberate practice to develop their genus.  These individuals didn't come out of the oven already done.  It took years of deliberate practice as well as a very good ability to cope with failure.  They had talent there is no doubt about this, but they took their talent somewhere, they pushed out of their comfort zone.

So what should we praise children for? The process, praise the drive to overcome failure, praise the work (not the result).  Praise and congratulate when a child does something out of his or her comfort zone.   Most success derives from a series of failures that one could overcome. We must be apart of the system to create a mindset for desire to challenge.

We spend too much time saying great job or great results…when we should be spending more time saying “I like the way you approached that.”  Or I like how you got to that answer.  The self-esteem movement almost brain washed that we could hand our children self-esteem on a sliver platter by telling them they are “great, brilliant, special, they are gifted. Those statements make children more fragile.

Telling them that I like the way you worked on that and the strategies you tried…I like the way you picked that hard test, you are going to learn a lot from that.  Those are the things that teach children how to build and tailor self-esteem on their own while they are growing

Some psychologists feel the use of praise in classrooms also is tricky and very often over-used.  Sandra Graham, a UCLA education professor, feels that false praise can actually undermine students' confidence. Rather than making them feel good, they get the message that their teacher doesn't expect very much.  In many classrooms, Graham feels that it is  just scripted that if the low achiever does anything, you praise them.

Dr. Janine Bempechat, Harvard professor and author urges parents to let children suffer through tough assignments to teach them the value of hard work.  Parents and teachers should emphasize that the value in homework assignments is the work involved not the end results.   Kids, she feels need the ability to delay gratification, to be persistent and to maintain interest even as they dislike the work that they are doing.

There is definitely a counter opinion to these concepts.  There are many advocates of self-esteem that remain undeterred.   "Kids who have a good sense of themselves and are avidly curious will learn . . . and never stop learning," John Vasconcellos (state legislator and education advocate from California) has been quoted as saying . "All the research in the world won't change my mind about it."

So where do you end up?  Certainly it seems very complicated to me.  Everyday I meet too many children to count that are smart, funny and precocious.  Even children that score low on IQ tests or struggle with concepts in school will often (if not always) amaze me in some way.  It would be impossible for me to NOT praise children no matter what anyone or any study states. One of the reasons I think we see so much success in therapy is the fact that we reward building the correct tools and empower the patient with the ability to fix visual problems themselves.  As the author even indicates (in the NY magazine article) it is very difficult to not call her own children smart.  The take home message to me is to not artificially boost self-esteem. I hope all the parents whom read this begin to look at how she (he) interact with her (his) child. I know I'm going to change my approach (at least just a little) when working with children.