There was article a while ago by John Rosemond criticizing schools for constantly trying new theories on children without testing them first. I have to admit we rolled our eyes at the administration forcing us to stop putting focus on phonics and use the whole language approach of learning words through context. Eventually, they reversed themselves again.
Another thing we kept trying to do was to always bolster our children's self-esteem. I remember our own children getting shiny participation trophies on top of the ones they got for actually winning something. Those little trophies didn't mean much to them and were soon discarded.
According to Rosemond's article, there has been research that showed high self-esteem associated with anti-social behavior. Bullying is one consequence. He also says that rewarding constantly often causes children to underperform and do the minimum because "anything they do is worthy of merit."
I found all this quite interesting. I hope the next generation will learn from what we did and do a better job. It will save them a lot of money not having to buy extra participation trophies for everybody.
According to Rosemond's article, there has been research that showed high self-esteem associated with anti-social behavior. Bullying is one consequence. He also says that rewarding constantly often causes children to underperform and do the minimum because "anything they do is worthy of merit."
I found all this quite interesting. I hope the next generation will learn from what we did and do a better job. It will save them a lot of money not having to buy extra participation trophies for everybody.
It is interesting for sure. Oh gosh I would not want to go through raising a child again but I guess I will get to help with the grandchild. It is tough out there.
ReplyDeleteThe sad part is that I don't think things will change! You make a good point.
ReplyDeleteYou KNOW I already agree with you on this. The last years of my teaching, students wanted only A's, thank you very much. Parents of my ninth-graders often fussed that "Johnny always got A's until he got YOU for a teacher." Here it is 8:10 a.m., and my blood pressure is starting to soar!
ReplyDeleteInteresting post. I usually agree with John Rosemond's approach. My kids (21 , 18 and 16) were recently talking about swim meets. They said the participation ribbon was the saddest one to get, or 8th place winner when there were only 8 places to begin with!
ReplyDeleteAnd don't even get me started on whole language versus phonics. That was a disaster.
Kay, Are you familiar with Charlotte Iserbyt's book, "The Deliberate Dumbing of America." and her lectures on YT? I've noticed how teaching differs from, say when I went to school, and kids don't seem to ask as many questions. I notice that in grandkids mostly.
ReplyDeleteI've been studying Charlotte for a year now and it all makes more sense. The teaching method did change in the 60's.
Our son suffered severely from a hair brained idea put in place in the schools when he was in grade school.
ReplyDeleteI decried this years ago and it's one of the many reasons that I would never teach. Yeah, I wanted my kids to feel they were good people but I made sure that they understood that the world did not revolve around them. The horrendous bullying going on in the schools is the upshot of these awful policies.
ReplyDeleteI graduated from high school in 1963, my brother in 1966, and my sister in 1970.
ReplyDeleteSomewhere in there, something changed. My brother (who was always the class clown, and an indifferent student although very bright) both learned how to spell when we were young.
Our sister, and her friend who eventually became my brother's wife, cannot spell, even now.
I don't know what happened, but something changed, and not for the better.
K
Roy Baumeister has some interesting things to say about self esteem. The recipe for failure in life is high self esteem combined with low performance.
ReplyDeletehttp://articles.latimes.com/2005/jan/25/opinion/oe-baumeister25
Oh, and of all the people I've met in my life, the ones with the highest self esteem were the prisoners I taught.
ReplyDeleteRosemond belongs to the Grinch School of child psychology, in my estimation. I find people to be very glib about how other's children are NOT brought up properly. Easy for them to criticize. Most parents do the best they can. Tough love will only work with normal children.
ReplyDeletePhonics has always made sense. Sounding out words means you don't have to learn every word for the first time. As a matter of interest on the side, Our family was brought up as friends of the family of the author of "Why Johnny Can't Read" by Rudolf Flesch. The real "Johnny" was a kid Flesch tutored in my home town of Dobbs Ferry, New York. Lest any parent get too smug, they were a wonderful family yet one of their children ended up as a stret person with schizophrenia.
In my experience bullying was a consequence of class envy, being beaten up at home, and feeling you were headed nowhere in life. The false Momma's advice that bullies are really cowards is not true and is of little use on the playground. Usually a bully is used to be hit and smacked around, especially at home, whereas the kid who is being picked on has never been hit at all.
ReplyDeleteI meant to say "STREET person with schizophrenia" in my earlier post. I'm a pretty good speller, but for some reason I falter on the internet. Also, I took it for granted that people would know that "Why Johnny Can't Read" started, or at least focused national attention on the phonics movement
This is interesting. Even in the early fifties, we got small rewards for the good things we did. Grades and stars, that was it.
ReplyDeleteI can't say I disagree with this article. Rewards are good, but everyone can't be winners all the time. My husband used to joke that he just wanted to hand out tiaras to every incoming freshman girl so each one could be a queen since he had so many problems with the queen nominations and etc. that take place in a high school. The bottom line was: every girl couldn't be a queen even though they had been brought up to believe they were princesses.
ReplyDeleteI've always thought that self esteem was something one earned through achievement. It is up to the teacher to make sure that things are in place to allow every child to succeed in some way. But the achievement must be real.
ReplyDeleteHattie's comment is a real eye opener. Quite a thought provoking post Kay. When I was coming up, somewhere aroung the invention of the wheel, we got rewards only if earned.
ReplyDeleteCounseling for Low Self-Esteem involves an exploration of, how it may have evolved (early experiences or more recent events), how it affects your day-to-day life, and how you would like things, to change. Counseling will offer you, the tools to reach those goals, in the context of, a safe and supportive therapeutic relationship, often, drawing on evidence-based Cognitive Behavioral Techniques.
Delete