“Mother, would you still like me if I were not clever?” The mistake of complimenting your child

A few days ago, my best friend shared a piece of parenting advice with me. Most parents praise their children in the wrong way, including her own. The wrong way of praise may lead the children to have the wrong cognition and eventually “go astray”.

The source of the matter is also from her daughter’s final math exam results, the day her daughter showed the final math exam paper to her bestie, has always been good at math only 70 points. Head of the natural very anxious, but still pressure temper patiently asked the reason.

Her daughter said it was because she did not see the two big questions at the end of the paper during the exam.

But my bestie saw at a glance, the daughter did not see the so-called two big topic has written traces, this is obviously a lie, the nature is more serious.

Was about to sternly educate her daughter, but did not expect the child suddenly cried, said: “Mom, if I am not smart, you will still like me?”

Bestie suddenly realized that children lie may be related to their own wrong way of education, the expression of praise children is not right.

Bestie admitted that his childhood is under the pressure of parents grow up, others praise her beautiful, but for the mother, where beautiful, ugly dead.

Once very easy to test the first grade, the first time back to tell the good news to his father, the result for a sentence, “the first fluke can not represent what, to every time the first test is really excellent.”

Under such repressive education, she was self-abasement since childhood and dared not show and express herself. Therefore, after having a daughter, she secretly decided that she could not repeat her own way of education.

Her daughter just learned to walk, will be timely praise her “you are so strong”, her daughter babble learn to speak, immediately praise her “you are smart”. The child in this praise to the second grade, but found a phenomenon, the daughter often for their own talent smug, the effort of this kind of behavior is dismissive or even despise.

She would often proudly tell her bestie that she only took half an hour to memorize this text, while another child in the class took two hours to memorize it. Sometimes, in order to please their mother, they will try to maintain their smart image.

Bestie worries that if this goes on, the child will lose the most authentic self, do other things will also focus too much on talent, misunderstanding the meaning of hard work.

How does a child compliment correctly?

1. Praising the outcome is not as good as encouraging the process

Praise will make the child feel happy, encouragement will give the child power, rather than praise the result, it is better to encourage the child in the process.

When the child comes back, he or she is happy to tell you that his or her grades are among the best. In exchange for the praise of his or her parents, it is better to encourage the child when he or she writes his or her homework carefully every day.

In the former case, parents praise the result, while in the latter case, parents encourage the process. The result is uncertain, but if every process is done correctly, the result is generally not too bad.

2. Hard work is better than talent

If the parents praise their children’s efforts, the children in the face of failure in the future, will think that if they work a little harder, maybe the next time can be successful, so they will find a way to spend time, hard work.

This way the child will think that success is within his control, not only will not hurt self-confidence, but also more brave in the face of difficulties. If you often praise the child’s talent, in the face of failure, the child will think that their talent is not enough, is not suitable for this thing, the failure situation is irretrievable, out of their control. The child will gradually lose confidence and become timid.

So parents try to encourage their children’s hard work rather than their talent.

3. It’s better to encourage children to be better than to let them live up to their parents’ expectations

Some parents will set a goal for their children and praise and reward them when they achieve it, but what parents should do is encourage their children to be better than they were yesterday.

Even if it is just a little progress every day, not afraid of slow step is afraid to stand still.

Success is a gradual accumulation of the process, take learning English, rather than encourage children to English test scores, it is better to encourage children every time to learn more than yesterday a few words, let the child become a better themselves, so a little bit of accumulation down to climb to the top of the mountain of success.

4. Avoid controlling compliments

“Mother loves children who are not picky eaters” and “if you don’t eat properly, mother will be angry” are all examples of controlled praise. In this environment, children will subconsciously cater to their parents’ needs if they want to get praise.

The right way should be from “I do this mom will be happy” to “I like to do this”, let the child have internal self-drive, do not rely on external encouragement and stimulation to do a thing, let the child have their own ideas.

In fact, the core of praising children is to be sincere and equal, so that children have a sense of security in psychology, that is, you do this thing well, I feel happy for you, even if you do not do well, mother can accept you, and then we will try to do things well together, mother will support you at any time.