Does Praise Add Pressure?

I'd love to know what you think about this article entitled Want to build your child's self-esteem from the fabulous CERC website. It's premise is that we, as parents, need to be very careful about the way we give feedback to our children to assure that we do not set them up for disappointment or low self-esteem if they do not measure up to all they think we want for them to be.

I fear I've fallen short a bit in this area, as one who's pretty regular at praising her sons for their accomplishments.  The article suggests a more refined praise paradigm:

Praise, then and now

OLD

You're brilliant.
You're a great hockey player.
You're smart.
You're so talented.
You're a great colourer.
You're a good artist.

NEW

I really like the way you tried all different ways and found one that worked.
I'm really happy for you -- you worked really hard on the ice today.
I like the way you took on a hard task. I like the way you stuck to it.
You're stretching yourself. You're trying new things.
I like the way you used colours.
That drawing makes me happy. Tell me about it.

So what do you think?  I'm fairly certain our parents praised us regularly, and I don't think my self-esteem didn't suffer too greatly. 

p.s. Is anyone aware of the trend towards "potty-training parties" mentioned at the end of the article?  I must have missed that one!

Book Resource:



Want to build your child's self-esteem?

Comments

[Marta Costa]

What a timely post. I've heard about this topic on the radio recently and then today at my son's soccer game I gave him the thumbs up sign and said "good job" and he looked at me with this doubtful face. He knew he hadn't done well. He wasn't really trying and he knew it and he knew I knew it. This got me thinking about changing how I talked to my children. Empty meaningless praise doesn't help them at all. Judging by the look on his face, my credibility with him definitely went down a notch.