The recent movement towards taking “praise” out of our parenting tools kits has me a bit baffled. I certainly understand the premise behind it all – Akfie Kohn has some valid reasons explaining the harm of praise on children (to use our own judgements to control their behaviour, to have them behave in a manner that begets more praise from us). I just have a hard time believing that praise is “harmful”. It’s one thing if it’s just lip service and not genuine. Any child can see through that. But surely I am not harming my child if I praise him for doing a good job? Are we being a little too picky about this? Is our generation of parents going overboard just a little in a backlash to the way we were raised?
See what you think…comments please.