Praise is a powerful tool that can be effective in encouraging learning
or detrimental to a child. Praise can be detrimental when the things praised
are permanent. This traps the student in their current situation and doesn’t
allow the ownership of actions to be taken. If kids are wrapped up in proving
their intelligence, when they make one bad decision, they may begin to doubt
their intelligence and to consider themselves as a failure.
According to
Dweck, children should be praised on effect and specific achievements. They
should not be praised according to intelligence. The more specific the praise
is, the better. This way, kids will know
exactly what they did right. Other students will also see small things that
they can do.
I like your point about praising things that are 'permanent'. You may also call these things uncontrollable or stable. Attribution theory (module 16) discusses why such things give students little power to improve--they can't change their strategy to get better if something is stable or uncontrollable.
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