Jane's Posts

June 1 1998

Bullies have lots of self esteem. [that is actually well documented in research -- the old view that they struck at people out of low self esteem turns out not to be true -- they are usually aggressive kids who think well of themselves but who have little to be proud of in the way of achievement - besides their physical aggression]

I have not found this to be true. Could you please cite sources for this?

One of the problems with parents and schools now is that they think self esteem can be detached from achievement.

This is correct. Self-esteem must be distinct from tangible achievement. People need to respect and appreciate what they ARE, not what they have done.

Otherwise failure will undermine self esteem. Certainly you agree that we all fail?

[snip]

Parents who want kids with high self esteem would do well to find out what they do well and like to do and encourage that so they can win praise for accomplishments...snip Schools would do well to make sure kids can read, etc etc as part of the plan to raise esteem -- rather than take the view as is common particularly in middle schools that 'anything you do is just great' and ' all you can do is your best' which in some schools literally translates into 'what ever low level of effort you expend is fine with us'

I find this argument internally inconsistent. You advocate sticking to what a child is good at, yet forcing her to excel at reading whether she has aptitude or not. How are these two positions reconcilable?

Also, if children do not feel free to explore every aspect of the world around them, how can they ever find what they do excel at?

jane

June 1 1998

Self-esteem must be distinct from tangible achievement. People need to respect and appreciate what they ARE, not what they have done.

This is the kind of argument that makes no sense to me. I used to hear that one should love the misbehaving child but not the behavior. For a time I would say that to one or another of my children when they were young. My son at age 5 told me that in that case I should figure out a way to give the behavior a time out (sitting on the third step) without involving him. Otherwise it was very obvious (to him) that I was angry with him *and* his behavior and was punishing him *for* his behavior. The concept had never made a lot of sense to me and I realized at that point that he was absolutely right. It was pure nonsense.

Well, sure, it's easy to lose your perspective and become angry in the heat of the moment. But you don't equate your child with his inappropriate behavior. Telling kids that THEY are bad never gets you anywhere. It takes away their belief that they CAN do the right thing. Do you see what I mean? If the child believes he is bad, then all he can do is bad things. In addition, it removes their responsibility for their own actions. A "bad" child can no more "be good" than a blind child can see. A "good" child can accept responsibility for her mistakes, learn from them, and do better the next time.

Each child should have a picture of herself as a truly wonderful person, because each of them IS truly wonderful. When children do something "wrong," we adults must point out that this behavior is inconsistent with the good and wonderful people they are. Similarly, whenever they do the right thing, we have to reinforce that by pointing out that it is what we expect of great people like them. We want them pursuing an ideal, not running from a spectre.

Children learn who they are from the world around them. They learn that they are lazy, stupid, boring, and bad the same way they learn they are red-haired, short, blue-eyed, and freckled. Once a characteristic is part of you, you can't do anything about it. Of course you can't understand math if you are stupid. But if you are the kind of person who TRIES hard when things are difficult, then you can get it in the end.

Which brings me (finally) to what upset me so much about Hamilton's post:

Parents who want kids with high self esteem would do well to find out what they do well and like to do and encourage that so they can win praise for accomplishments.

This is exactly the WRONG thing to do. Praise is most important for effort where we do not have aptitude. Our entire lives are spent doing things we do not excel at. By definition excellence is rare. Even if we do surpass all others in one area, we still have to function in innumerable other areas in which our very best efforts will be mediocre. Besides, except for the occasion freak, we do not excel in our first attempts at anything. If we do not praise sincere effort, even if the end result is poor, then how do we encourage our children to keep trying? That's all there is to life - trying to do your best.

jane