The Sheila Variations

This approach could apply to just about any situation. Too often people see criticism as a personal affront when, often times, it is a huge favor. Ego I tell you, ego.

For what it's worth, I checked the NYT link. The intro to Citizen Girl posted there has Bulwer-Lytton Award written all over it....

I couldn't agree more. TMPR has reached epidemic proportions in our culture.

I especially liked the part of that article where she pointed out the difference between praising a specific performance and telling a kid that he or she is a genius. If you're a genius, then pretty much anything you do is bound to be great, irrespective of the amount of hard work or thought that went into it. Needless to say, such is almost always not the case.

Ken -

I know. Jeez. Uh ... "penis-head". Gimme a break.

Mike R -

That part struck me too. The fact that your kid can draw does not mean, necessarily, that he/she is a "great artist".

DON'T EVEN TRY, NANNY DIARIES!

Sorry I couldn't resist.

TMPR = that's a nice way of referring to the epidemic of 'niceness' that wants to make sure everyone feels 'validated' and 'special' and to 'build self-esteem.' Probably stems from the same impulse that seeks to ban dodgeball as too competitive, and would never dream of giving a child a grade of 'F.'

This is an epidemic that starts with the young. My son's first grade teacher went on and on about his, and the other student's, self-esteem. I finally told her, "My son doesn't need any more self-esteem. If he gets even a little more, he will be downright insufferable." There is nothing wrong with constructive criticism or an occasional failure.

Ted Bundy apparently had wonderful self-esteem.

I mean, you do not want to crush a kid's soul - I've seen that happen too. But it's ridiculous now - the praise is way over-blown.

And so Ken, yes, I say: Don't even TRY, Nanny-girls!!

One of the most important skills in business is the ability to take criticism and to give it constructively. Many of those who have been indoctrinated with self-esteem will bristle at every criticsm or suggestion, to the point where superiors and peers will say "Why bother? Just let him fail." And, in the event that the hyperselfesteemers ever become managers (shudder), they will most likely deliver criticism in such an egocentric and self-absorbed manner that it will be worse than useless.

David -

I've had some managers like that. Ick.

One thing I just thought of: a friend of mine took a writing class, here in the city, and - whoever was in the "hot seat" - (the person whose writing was being evaluated by the group) - was not allowed to speak.

They were not allowed to respond to any of the criticisms.

Some criticism will be useless.

Some criticism will even be harmful. You need to be able to filter out the stuff meant to harm you, meant to clip your wings. Some teachers/coaches/people in authority will say things to you, as an actor, that comes out of jealousy, or a personal need to take you down a peg - as opposed to wanting to help you grow. Failed actors who have not come to terms with their own failures are uncomfortable in the presence of confident young actors. And so they want to rob these young geniuses of their confidence.

Failed actors who have become teachers usually want to be "gurus". A guru's main goal is to keep students in their classes - A guru makes the students feel that the student's work is never good enough - "you need more classes, more classes". The guru must feel necessary.)

Criticism from charlatans like that must be discarded. I've seen many an actor ruined. I was taught by a guru like that - and she did not want me to fly, or grow. She wanted me to sloooooooow down. She did not like how self-sufficient I was. She wanted me to conform. Finally - 2 months into her class - I realized I was becoming MORE self-conscious than free - and I got the hell out of there. Many an actor has been ruined by such a teacher.

But some criticism you must be willing to hear.

Just sit there and take it. And shut up.

I would offer one contrary idea on this subject.

Some grade schools (no idea how many) do a rigid letter grade system with GPA's and the whole bit, and I think that's a bad idea. Grade school is the proper place to challenge all kids to strive to do their very best, even those at the top of their class. Not all kids develop at the same pace, and while I strongly believe kids should not be coddled, I don't think it's necessary to place the burden of adult-style competition on them at such a young age. Open academic competition in grade school does more harm than good, both for the winners who get perhaps over-inflated self-esteem and the losers who may end up with a deficit.

Of course I also believe that when you do start handing out grades, they should be REAL and not just "A's for effort."

MikeR...I understand the thinking behind your objection to grades in elementary school, but...most kids seem to like competition in *other* aspects of life. Usually, they like competitive sports and enjoy board games, card games, etc. So what message are we sending if we say that school is the one area in which competition doesn't exists? Is the implied message that school is *more important* or *less important*?

This reminds me of a story that I heard several years ago from a man named John Randals.

He was telling of his childhood, and how when he was 8 years old or so, he took piano lessons. He was terrible.

At one recital he had to follow one of the best students. She went out and played an amazing piece. It was very difficult and she played if very well. When she finished, she came back stage after the applause of the audience, the teacher citied every fault in the performance and urged her to work harder.

Then John went out to play. His piece was so simple; he played only with his right hand and occasionally his left thumb. Despite that, he still stumbled through it. As he came backstage to some obvious pity applause his teacher just hugged him and told him he did well.

John says that even at that age, he knew what that meant. He knew he didn't do well. What he saw and felt was that the teacher didn't really care. His ability wasn't worth criticizing. He wasn't really worth her time.

Criticism is a much needed aspect of love, when we fail to provide it we are harming rather than helping.

On the less serious side it also reminds me of a scene from the British police comedy The Thin Blue Line:

The police are discussing the problem of graffiti, when one of them pipes in with, “I blame refrigerator magnets.” The lead officer, with some astonishment, asks him to explain. The officer responds, explaining how parents are always taking every horrible finger painting that kids create and hanging them proudly on the refrigerator. This continues, he says, until the children believe that everything they turn out is a work of art fit for display, and they continue their lives scribbling everywhere; thus the problem with graffiti.

I'm not arguing against competition per se in grade school, just against having a letter grade system. You can still have all sorts of competitions that let a kid get a good idea of where he stands in the class.

The difference between school and other forms of competition is that it's far more central to one's self-image than playing baseball or Monopoly. Hanging "A-Student" and "C-Student" labels on kids at six years old just seems a bad idea to me.

The ideal situation would be to have engaged, imaginative teachers with small classes who challenge every student - from the slowest to the brightest - to do better than they thought they could do. There's a lot more to life than what can be placed on a test. To me, grade school is the place to challenge kids to think creatively without having to worry about the implications of getting an 83 versus a 94.

Our cognitive skills aren't only what we use to make it through secondary and post-secondary education and eventually earn a living, they're also all we have at our disposal to navigate the treacherous waters of the adult world at large. Too much concentration on rote learning and "teaching the test" - especially at a very early age - is bad for the development of agile, creative, critical thinking.

It's true that our schools are currently FAR away from the environment I'm suggesting, but a simplistic rote learning approach will not equip today's kids for the extreme challenges they'll face in the information society in which they're destined to live.

"The difference between school and other forms of competition is that it's far more central to one's self-image than playing baseball or Monopoly." Not at my school, it wasn't. Among the boys, at least, academics didn't hold a candle to baseball.

Of course most boys would be more interested in baseball than academics, but surely not many of them believed that they would end up earning their living in MLB. If they did, then their math teacher did a really lousy job of explaining that 700 divided by 250,000,000 is a very small number.

Even if they don't like academics, most kids understand that doing well in academics is an important factor in eventually being able to earn a good living. If a kid comes from a bad home environment and starts out at a huge disadvantage, early academic failure can eliminate any chance for him to believe he could be a success.

The LAST thing I'm saying that kids who do poorly should get shuffled through the system because we feel sorry for them. That's what we're doing now, and it's obviously a disaster. I'm only suggesting that grade school should be a sort of incubation chamber, where we create fertile conditions for kids to grow. Give the kids who start out at a deficit a few years to catch up, and let the kids who dominate wait a few years before they start compiling their gaudy GPA's.

Making the whole grade school experience about standardized testing is a simple solution for a complex problem - it will not get us where we need to go.

Mike R -

The thing I don't like about the system now is that it holds BACK the geniuses. I use that term kind of lightly - to mean the kids who are smart beyond their years. Geniuses make the rest of the class uncomfortable. They now are engaged in projects where they have to "help" the slower kids - because it's all about community-building - as opposed to being about acceleration.

There are always going to be slower kids. Holding geniuses back, and not letting the cream rise to the top, because it makes everyone else feel bad, serves no one.

It's a tough lesson - but I do believe that some kids need to be set free, need to be able to go as fast as they want to.

School is not for everyone.

I was in Honors English in high school - I was always very advanced in terms of language. And I was in, as my cousin Emma calls it, "retard Math".

But since I had been allowed to move as quickly as I wanted to in English - since I was reading at very advanced levels all along - since I knew I was GOOD at it - because I had been allowed to surge forward, to accelerate - the fact that I was in "retard Math" didn't damage my self-esteem TOO much.

It's not the worst thing in the world to realize you can't do something, or that you are not the best in something.

I knew I was good at other things. My self-esteem wasn't shattered by retard Math.

I think I'm still in "retard Math." I don't do numbers. I'm not sure I'd enjoy it even if I could. And that's fine.

I am definitely still in "retard Math". I still do sums counting on my fingers. The words "carry the one" are sometimes said.

Red, I think we're talking apples and oranges.
By the time kids get to high school, they should be able to handle some segmentation by interest and ability. And their ability level in HS will be a pretty good predictor of the potential for success in college.

But, you just can't say that a six year old's ability level is a reliable predictor of how he/she will do in college and beyond. There are too many factors involved - the nature of the kid's home life, the pace of their developmental progression, etc. By labeling a six year old kid a C-Student, you may be creating a very undesirable self-fulfilling prophesy.

Mike R -

Oh Jesus, totally! My comment wasn't meant as a disagreement, or agreement.

I don't think I even had grades that early in school.

But I do know I was allowed to surge ahead in stuff I was good at, read at my own level - I wasn't forced to "help" the slower readers in the class catch up - which is a common practice now.

I was in 2nd grade, reading Christmas Carol while other kids were struggling with remedial reading. In the same way that I was sweating out in my retard Math, while other little geniuses could explain the theory of relativity to me at age 8 (Dee Dee Sormanti. I remember her so clearly - describing to me what the formula E=mc2 meant - in 3rd grade. So bizarre.)

Well, it helps when we respect the person giving the criticism. And, If they don't know their arse from their oboe, no amount of criticism from them will make us better.

But an interesting thing about crit. and compliments I heard from a wise mom (my sister!): praise the event if it is worthy of praise, and not the child. If the kid does something really well, praise the thing, and offer constructive crit. as a teacher.

I think the same goes for art (or education) - if someone's acts aren't worthy of praise, fergawdsake don't praise it. Even if they frown. Or cry. Or kick you really hard. This happens in music studios quite a bit: lousy performances are given warm fuzzy oogling. Ugh! How about "That sucked. Try again??". Giving criticism meant to make someone better.. definitely. It is required from a good producer or director or choreographer. It is also a good example of letting the cream rise to the top, and it *is* grossly unfair that schools don't reinforce the idea, so when kids get out to the real world (so to speak), they're shocked (SHOCKED!) that mediocre performances are met with shredding criticism and unemployment.

Oh, and Aaron - thanks for this comment: "Criticism is a much needed aspect of love"...Woah. Very true.

"In New York City, if you are of any age, denomination, or race, and own a penis, you can say anything that comes into your penis-owning head to anyone, of any age, denomination, or race, who does not own a penis."

New York City appears to be rather different from the Midwest. I've heard that New York is different, but...

But hey wait, my wife says she owns my penis, and nothing stops her from saying anything that comes into her head, so maybe there's some truth to this after all!

There's a lesson to be learned in how to take criticism. But then you also have to learn when and how to reject it, how to decide that it's off-base. No clear rules I guess, but it sounds like these Nanny-girls are getting too big for their britches. Either that, or, like Margaret Wilder, they really only had one book in 'em, and just haven't realized it yet.

Well, criticism can be WRONG - if spoken by a charlatan.

I've had plenty of directors give me direction which I flat-out, in my gut, knew was WRONG and would make me look bad. And I would fight for my survival up there - you have to!

But constructive criticism - from a mentor, from a respectable editor (and St. Martin's Press is an unbelievably respectable organization - I would definitely 'take the coaching' from them!!) - or from someone who is an acknowledged expert in the field - should definitely be considered. And seriously.

And Dean? Lucky Rosemary!!

Aw shux.

Red, I do agree about holding back the smart kids. Making them tutor the other kids is wrong. Anything along those lines should be completely voluntary and after regular school hours. Bright kids deserve a good education just as much as anyone else - teaching to the lowest common denominator is a terrible, harmful practice.

"But, you just can't say that a six year old's ability level is a reliable predictor of how he/she will do in college and beyond. There are too many factors involved - the nature of the kid's home life, the pace of their developmental progression, etc. By labeling a six year old kid a C-Student, you may be creating a very undesirable self-fulfilling prophesy. "

Giving a kid the C that he earned isn't "labeling him a C-Student". You're evaluating his work, not him, and you're not evaluating the work he's capable of, since you probably haven't even seen that yet. And if he doesn't understand that, well, that's one of the things that he needs to learn, sooner rather than later.