Praising children appropriately is an art. Many of us have been taught to praise children, by saying, “Good Job!”,”You are the best!”, “You are such a good girl!” Research has shown that this type of praise does not improve children’s self-esteem. Why? Because the above praise is actually a judgement of a child’s behavior.
When we use judgment words to praise kids it suggests to children that they are good only if they obey us and do what we want them to do. Children will then naturally assume that when they misbehave or are non-compliant they are bad. Children who grow up with this message from the adults around them can have many problems. There self-esteem can suffer, they have a hard time bouncing back from making mistakes. They can become people pleasers, looking for another’s approval, saying things like “Do you like this?, Is this okay?”
They turn into adults who are nervous to take chances because they might fail. Their work might not be “good enough”.
Becky Bailey in her book, “Easy To Love Difficult To Discipline”, explains this phenomena even further: “If you praise your child to get them to behave well, your praise will actually backfire…You might say things like, ‘I like how you behaved yourself in the grocery store’, or ‘I am proud of you when you do well at school’,in hopes of future good behavior or performances. But that tells your child, ‘I like it when you please me.’She may well conclude,’I am only lovable when I please my parents,”and that when she misbehaves, you will not like her.”
We need to praise children in a way where we are noticing their positive behavior in a non-judgmental manner. Here is an example of how this can be done:
Don’t Judge: Describe:
For more information on how to praise our children appropriately, join our “Parenting Simply” 6 week workshop. Looking forward to seeing you there.