Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums GT Research Only praising kids for working hard

I think we have always tended toward the praising for effort rather than result. Recently, however, I have started to think about how dd's school peers probably get a lot more affirmation for their good grades and/or "good girl" behavior than dd would get because she is only praised for effort. She has seemed unsure of herself recently and I am trying to find ways to praise her more - or at least moments to acknowledge when she does behave "correctly." It makes me very uncomfortable to think about right and wrong behavior, but I think kids' behavior is judged all the time - if they are at school - so I'm trying to catch up somehow.

I took a class on PBIS.Positive Behavior. Intereventions and Supports. It is a professional development class all special education teachers are required to take. Reasearch has shown all children and all people need the same positive supports. Not all states have passed laws requiring Gifted children have a IEP. But if your child needs behavior supports to redirect his behavior at school with positive verbal promts. A behavioral intervention plan is designed to do that. Laura A. Riffel, Ph.D at www.behaviordoctor.org has a free (FBA) Functional Behavioral Assessment Data Tool. You can e-mail : laura.riffel@yahoo.com if you would like supports or knowledge of what is considered the most effective way to address behavior in approiate ways. I took this class since my childs behavior interfered with his education and was so challenging. He also requires constant positive reinforcement. The information was also helpful to know how to support the teacher who hadn't had the class. Oklahoma State Department of Education is offering a three year program called PBIS that trains the whole school. A program that is supportive of all children and parents. I also found the college level book for teachers, Behavior Interventions for Teachers, and read it. I wish someone would have shared this information with me when my child was 3 years old. Since it would have allowed me to get the services at school he needed to be suscessful. It also gave me information I needed to work with the school so I knew what they were required to provide. Having the latest scientifically researched information on behavior resolved my anziety as to how to address his behavior. I also found a website Cybary Man's Education/Understanding Asynchronous Development in Gifted Children.... Wrightslaw.cybaryman.com/gifted.html that helped me very much. Hope this info was of use. P.S. try contacting your State Department of Education,Special Education services to see if they have free training classes for PBIS if you are interested in advocacy or sharing the information with your school distric. NCLB educational goal #8 made parents equal partners in our children's education where our opinion counts.

Do most gifted kids really think they are smart?
If a lot of them are self critical I would think the opposite.
My DS7 thinks he is an idiot.

DS6 knows he's "smart". But he doesn't think he's good at much else.

Most of the teachers I have seen are know it alls themselves!!

They like to judge and not be judge themselves.

The best teacher my son had was the one who did judge him at all. She gave him work he was ready for because he could do it and it was not a power struggle of whether or not the kid was smart

Most teachers have this power stuggle going on and want to point out weaknesses to prove the kid might not be smart etc.

Ahh...wow. I'm not sure how I would have responded to that. Sounds to me like someone needs to reconsider her career in GT "education."

Val

When I was in school I usually made straight A's unless I had PE in which case it was inevitable that I would make one B. I competed in class for the highest scores on tests. I thought I was good at taking tests, but not much else. I was afraid to try anything new because I was afraid I would fail. I did worry that my son would be this way also.

My son, although he is twice exceptional, is different. The only praise he accepts is when he finds a way to do something that is difficult for him. Winning a spelling bee is easy for him. The challenge level is so easy that it doesn't mean that much to him. This is one way that I think video games actually helped him. My son knows that he has a higher challenge level than a lot of people on this board because of the migraines, the scoliosis brace, having to deal with a helicopter mom with anxiety issues, foot pain and low endurance because of low muscle tone, and what I think is an unusual visual perceptual problem that causes some unusual problems in reading music, math, drawing and handwriting that he has had to find ways to compensate for on his own.

Praise for him is when he proves that he can do what it takes to get the job done by the deadline even with the higher challenge level. For him, this deadline is the final dress rehearsal in musical theater. Somehow, even with all the difficulties, he manages to do what it takes. I realize that it must take incredible focus for him to do this when he is only able to practice dances about half the time the other kids practice. Learning lines and song lyrics quickly is not challenging, but putting it all together while dancing is. He proved that he can do what it takes. He gets lead roles now and he is not a back row dancer any more.

He says he likes to prove people wrong when he knows they think he might not be able to do something. He always chooses the higher challenge level. He is a gifted learner even though he has to learn differently sometimes and I am becoming more confident now that he will find a way to learn what he needs to learn even if I don't know how to help him. Now that he is 12, he doesn't want my help in some things and even though we are homeschooling he says he can learn things better on his own.

Your son sounds just wonderful to me.

"... if a child thinks that their success is due to being smart then they will fear trying again and possibly failing because then they won't be smart anymore. It makes sense and I believe it."

I don't think it's as simple as that. You must know your child; it's simply not a matter of being able to generalize.

From personal experience, a gifted child can struggle with understanding the gift they have. I can assure you it's possible to know you're smart and feel stupid at the same time.

Through 8th grade there never was a challenge for me in school. I probably could have completed 8th grade work by the time I finished 2nd grade. I never did homework since I already knew how to do it and as long as I aced the tests no one complained. Still, I felt stupid and lazy because I did the bare minimum. I remember in 2nd grade I got a black star on my reading chart because I didn't do the number of required book reports. I felt like a complete idiot. What they had no way of knowing was that I had already finished every book in the local library that they would allow me to get my hands on. You had to be in High School to access the "Adult" section. I was lucky to have an older brother who would check books out for me.

By the time I entered HS, I had zero work study habits. I hated school. I felt I didn�t fit in and I really didn't feel smart. My grades were all over the place since I didn't apply myself, yet I still maintained a decent average. I was accepted to every college I applied to. 165 credits later and still no degree! *grin* (and Gosh! I STILL am successful!)

The day I suspected I was smarter than I realized was sometime senior year we had a guidance counselor visit a class to chat and the conversation went something like this"
Student: "Has there ever been a genius at this school?"
Counselor (looking away from me when I perked up at the question): "In the history of this school there has been one genius.�
Student: "Can you tell us who it was?"
Counselor: "No."
Student: "Why not?"
Counselor: "Because they still go to this school."
Student: "Do they know?"
Counselor: "No."
Student" "Why don't they know?"
Counselor: (As she stared directly at me): "Because we believe if they knew, they wouldn't try"
Me (To myself): "Newsflash lady, they're not trying NOW."

I didn't confirm it for many years that it was indeed me. I wish there had been something back then for me to try striving for and some real guidance as to what was possible.

I don't mean that to sound depressing, because I did a fantastic amount of learning outside of school on my own. I was never bored outside of school and I pursued many interests.

I can't say that if I knew I was smart or not would have made a difference in higher education. I do think I might have felt better about myself and maybe bolstered my confidence socially, but without the infrastructure to support my appetite I think my academic career was doomed for failure. Then again, knowing I was a nerd wouldn't have changed that fact. I still am a bit a of a social misfit!

Today, I let my children know they are smart. I see no reason to hide it. It doesn't have to be presented as, "You're smarter than everyone else and you can let them know it." but it can be along the lines of "I know you have the ability, now let�s work a bit harder!" and "wonderful, you pushed yourself and look what you did!�

I�ll suggest that it's all how you present it to the child. If there's a lesson I have learned in life it is that the only mistake you can make is not having tried to correct a mistake. Failure is just an opportunity to add to your knowledge that one method for sure doesn't work! Being smart is no guarantee that you won�t hit a wall but hopefully it will help you to walk around it next time.

This one is so tricky, isn't it? An anecdote: I was reading a blog just the other day by a young man whose education has had much of what I'm looking for for my DS - in fact that was how I got to the blog, by searching for things by and about people who'd been through one particular school, which attracts (and savagely selects) an extraordinarily talented cohort of students and then challenges and enriches them to the nines. He's clearly both very talented and very well educated, and he sounds like a nice young man as well - but as far as I can tell from his writing, he genuinely has no feeling for how unusual he is. When faced with an exam paper that's supposed to be very hard, and it isn't, he assumes he was misled about the paper; on the occasions when he fails to do something, he assumes he was being terribly stupid and that everyone else will think so. In a way this is endearing, but even at the high powered universities he's looking at, it will get him into trouble. He'd be better off realising how unusual he is and knowing when to keep quiet about it. On the other hand, that he's been surrounded at school by enough people of comparable achievement that he's able to hold this misconception is quite something. I don't know what's the right thing to do as a parent, beyond "tell the truth and share your values" which can't really be wrong.