Do schools believe that?

The fastest way to succeed is to double your failure rate."

--Thomas J. Watson, former CEO of IBM

Good job?

An anthroplogist studying Waldorf schools looks for the secret to developing self-esteem.  Thank you for presenting one perspective and for making me think about this (Can you make me think?  Probably not.  How about provoke?  Or precipitate?  Or cause? Or encourage?  Language matters.  It conveys meaning and meta-meaning, the message and the message behind the message.)

I agree that "good job" is a poor form of praise.  Yes, praise, in general, inadvertently, unintentionally, and unavoidably traps the recipient in external motivation.  This is praise, the addictive drug.

"Thank you," according to EJ Sobo, expresses appreciation while avoiding the praise trap.  "Thank you."  Translation:  "I noticed you.  I noticed what you did.  I appreciate the help you gave.  I'm grateful to you." 

My favorite "thank you" story comes from Thich Nhat Hanh.  If someone says to you, "You have a beautiful smile," you'll be tempted to say, "thank you." 

That person is really saying "Your smile has made this moment better for me.  Thank you."  So your response should really be, "You're welcome."

The encounter reads like this:
"You have a beautiful smile."
"You're welcome."

Is there a useful form of praise?  I sometimes make a statment that begins, "I really like ..."  What follows is an honest statement of what I think, identified as my thought rather than as unversal truth ("That's good.")

What follows?  Specific feedback.  One of our roles as teachers is to make "points of interest" to help our students to improve their performance.  "Good job" is not helpful, and since it creates a hunger for external praise, is in fact, harmful.  What would be helpful? 

"I really like the colors in your painting.  You kept them pure and bright, and didn't mix them together into a muddy mess like some painters do."  This is useful information.  The painter knows this is my thinking, my response.  He also knows specifically what I admire, what qualities I like in a painting.

And finally, check out Carol Dweck's point of view:  Praise effort, not intelligence.  Check out her book Mindset, one of the most surprisng insights into the motivation of learning. Or if you prefer the You Tube version, here it is.

How to take NO for an answer

Here's a blog that's new to me:  The Genius in Children by Rick Ackerly.  Rick spoke at the recent retreat of the Montessori Administrators Association.

A sweet story about a grandfather and his granddaughter.

"Nothing is as important as this moment"

50 ways to build emotionally healthy kids -- a blog entry from former Post Oak School counselor, Mary Jo Rapini.

Batman and Beyond

The following letter was sent to the parents of Austin Montessori School and is used with their permission.

Dear Parents,

We are all stunned and grief-stricken at the violence that erupted at a midnight screening of the latest Batman movie. The news coverage has been pervasive and will continue as the investigation and, ultimately, the trial continues.

We would like to recommend the following excellent advice from Dr. Laura Markham about how to talk to children who may be exposed to media coverage or conversations with peers or other adults.

http://www.ahaparenting.com/_blog/Parenting_Blog/post/How_To_Talk_with_Kids_about_Tragedies_Like_the_Aurora,_Colorado_Shooting/

Those of us dedicated to the healthy social and psychological development of children are also saddened to know that even had there been no gunman, no bullets and no booby-trapped apartment that night, there still would have been trauma in the theater. It would have been quiet, hard to see, and unnoticed by the media, but it would have been no less real to the children in that theater -- infants, 3 year-olds, 6 year-olds, 10 year-olds -- whose parents chose to ignore the PG-13 rating and warnings like this one from IMDb.com: "Parents should note that this is in no way a typical superhero movie. It is a violent and gritty story that is powerful and moving. But also very violent and disturbing. Definitely not recommended to children younger than 13."

As Maria Montessori wrote in 1947 in an open letter to the world's governments,

"Childhood constructs with what it finds. If the material is poor, the construction is also poor. […] In order to build himself, he has to take by chance, whatever he finds in the environment. The child is the forgotten citizen, and yet, if statesmen and educationalists once came to realize the terrific force that is in childhood for good or for evil, I feel they would give it priority above everything else."

Although our society is in some ways obsessed with childhood, our children are still too often "forgotten citizens." If we want to create a world in which tragedies such as the one in Aurora rarely, if ever, happen, we can continue to work on behalf of children everywhere, through Montessori education, through political action, through sharing with our family, friends and neighbors what we know about the needs of children, and through supporting the enlightened efforts of many others, such as the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood (www.commercialfreechildhood.org).

In our children, there is great hope for our world.

The Administrative Team

Entreprenurial Montessori Violinist

Must be the violin case that gives her away:  Diana Cohen is a Mafioso; a certified member of the Montessori Mafia -- so named by Peter Sims in his Wall Street Journal article of a year ago.  As Sims reported, "The Montessori Mafia showed up in an extensive, six-year study about the way creative business executives think."

Cohen is not a business executive exactly.  She is first and foremost a violinist--the concertmaster of the Richmond Symphony in Virginia.  So she is professionally creative.  She is also " the mastermind behind ChamberFest Cleveland, a festival of chamber music that will present its inaugural season Wednesday, June 27, through Sunday, July 1, at several venues."

Cohen models creative entrepreneurial behavior:  she had an idea and ran with it; she had the vision, the energy, the organizational skills and the willingness to do what she had never done before.  She was willing to risk failure.  And she is making a cultural impact on the city where she grew up:  Cleveland, Ohio; where she attended Ruffing Montessori School.  (full disclosure:  one of my former students -- a great kid!)




 

Perfect!

"Striving for excellence motivates you; striving for perfection is demoralizing." --Harriet Braiker, American psychologist and writer. (Thanks to ASCD SmartBrief for its "Quote of the Day".)

Is it because striving for excellence embraces mistakes along the way?  And that striving for perfection entails a fear of mistakes?