the single most important and cost-effective intervention in education?
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/20...earn-faster-2/
"When kids were praised for their effort, nearly 90 percent chose the harder set of puzzles. However, when kids were praised for their intelligence, most of them went for the easier test. What explains this difference? According to Dweck, praising kids for intelligence encourages them to “look” smart, which means that they shouldn’t risk making a mistake."
"One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."
Dweck's article:
http://www.stanford.edu/dept/psychol...erformance.pdf
ABSTRACT
Praise for ability is commonly considered to have beneficial effects on motivation. Contrary to this
popular belief, six studies demonstrated that praise for intelligence had more negative consequences
for students' achievement motivation than praise for effort. Fifth graders praised for intelligence
were found to care more about performance goals relative to learning goals than children praised
for effort. After failure, they also displayed less task persistence, less task enjoyment, more lowability attributions, and worse task performance than children praised for effort. Finally, children
praised for intelligence described it as a fixed trait more than children praised for hard work,
who believed it to be subject to improvement. These findings have important implications for how
achievement is best encouraged, as well as for more theoretical issues, such as the potential cost of
performance goals and the socialization of contingent self-worth.
"One day, we shall die. All the other days, we shall live."
Sort of understandable. What I think is interesting is you can encourage young kids can rest on their laurels at an early age.
That sort of reaction to being praised for intelligence. . . is so counter-intuitive to me. I'm having trouble wrapping my brain around it.Originally Posted by Aimless
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
You should have kids then
I see it every day, always looking for the easy out to reach that reward quicker. Taught me a few things about giving children options.
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
I find it very natural. If you're considered the smartest kid in the class, if you have trouble on a question, you don't want to ask it for fear of looking stupid (lowering your status). I think it's vitally important to teach kids their are no dumb questions, and it's better to figure out something right now then to be confused it the whole time.
I hope no one takes from this study that it's bad to call kids smart or intelligent, this is good for their development; however, to take that it's important to encourage their work ethic, and encourage them to try harder and harder material, as they do well.
Don't always leave it, as OG said, up to them to choose how.
Last edited by Lebanese Dragon; 10-07-2011 at 06:28 PM.
Is it really? If someone says you're intelligent all the time, why would you bother putting in a lot of work? After all, you expect your intelligence to give you the results you need.
Hope is the denial of reality
I get what LittleFuzzy is thinking. At first glance I too said, "huh?" But after thinking about it, if you're simply told you're smart and not that you put a good effort into something, is it more like an entitlement feeling? You don't have to "prove" anything anymore? Or maybe being thought of as a hard worker is more rewarding than just being smart with no effort?
It would have been interesting (though may be more muddled of an experiment) to have another group who is praised for both being smart and putting in a good effort- to see if that yielded even better results.
EDIT: Okay I read the actual first article. Interesting analysis. Now I wonder if they had taken those two groups and switched around the praise for a final test, what would happen? Just for curiosity's sake.
My experience *and my own reaction* has been that you look for ways to top what earned you that bit of praise last time.
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
and when that praise or your skills plateau? (which happens rather quickly in clustered learning for children and in a school environment)
"In a field where an overlooked bug could cost millions, you want people who will speak their minds, even if they’re sometimes obnoxious about it."
Really? It has been a topic when I was in therapy; praise made me disdainful of other people. If they were stupid enough to praise me while I wasn't even making an effort that had to mean they were easily fooled. Also it made me a person excessively harsh on myself. Regardless of what I did it was either not good enough or a failure.
Took me years to turn that a little bit around.
Eh, my response to being the smartest person in the class was to spend more time on things unrelated to schoolwork. Why put in a lot of time into something when you can get an A without trying?
I don't like being praised in general though; makes me feel uncomfortable.
Hope is the denial of reality
That's a red flag, do something about it. And don't think learning how to gracefully accept compliments will do the trick. That should be the outcome, not the remedy.
I'm no longer the smartest person around, so this is much less of an issue. Praise in my part of academia is hard to come by anyway. There's always someone better, frequently significantly so.
Hope is the denial of reality
A crash when you try something that is just flat-out beyond you. And it always seemed to me that the "more intelligent" you were, the faster you pushed yourself into a completely untenable demonstration.
Last night as I lay in bed, looking up at the stars, I thought, “Where the hell is my ceiling?"
For a Motivated and Intelligent person you're probably right, but just because someone is intelligent pushing themselves to upper limits isn't always on the agenda. You have to understand here it's not about actually knowing anything, these kids who are being called smart are trying to uphold a status, by making it so whenever they speak they're right, whatever they do they succeed at... it's a status they're trying to keep up with their peers, to their teachers, etc... That's why they'll often choose task they're sure they will succeed at.
It's also dangerous mentality, and one we need to combat because we need to downplay the opinion of peers it just hurts their growth.
Last edited by Lebanese Dragon; 10-09-2011 at 08:09 PM.
Psychology usually divides people into two categories when it comes to task choosing: "Fearful of failure" and "Confident of success".
The fearful ones usually either tend towards easy tasks because they know for sure they can solve them. Or they choose the really hard tasks because with those it's not that big of a deal if they fail.
Confident persons tend to tasks of medium difficulty.
I'm not quite sure that intelligence plays much of a role here. Of course there's also the problem that "intelligence" is dastardly hard to properly define.
When the stars threw down their spears
And watered heaven with their tears:
Did he smile his work to see?
Did he who made the lamb make thee?
Gads, this was me in grade school. High School became quite the shock.
Also I have the same issue with praise...very weird...what's the Red Flag for Hazir? Becoming a sociopath?
Brevior saltare cum deformibus viris est vita
Half of it was the ridiculous education system in the US. I finished second grade in Russia, and that got me through 9th grade in math in the US (I only had to start making some effort with trigonometry and pre-calc). Americans are also incompetent when it comes to learning rules of grammar, which means any non-native speaker who learned English will be better than them.Gads, this was me in grade school. High School became quite the shock.
Also I have the same issue with praise...very weird...what's the Red Flag for Hazir? Becoming a sociopath?
I thought sociopaths liked praise?
Hope is the denial of reality
Well, a buddy of mine called me a sociopath in a conversation about my (lack of) empathy...and I don't take praise well (not saying my lack of empathy I viewed as praise)I thought sociopaths liked praise?
Brevior saltare cum deformibus viris est vita
Same here, and also not sure why it's a red flag. It might be from Hazir's own issues, which are different from mine. I definitely don't feel disdainful of others due to praise, my problem with it is different.Also I have the same issue with praise...very weird...what's the Red Flag for Hazir? Becoming a sociopath?
Streaming is my preferred intervention in schools then. I was put in the top set of each of my classes at school, thus I was competing at a higher level against others also at a higher level. Able to be stretched more.
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