Can You Praise Your Child Too Much?

Also watch Praise addiction – real and dangerous for your child and Can you give your child too much attention?

Praising children is important. It makes children feel good and also boosts their self-esteem.

But – can you praise your child too much? The answer is yes.

And too much praise can be bad for children.

So why do we praise children?

When we praise our children – we praise them to tell them that what they are doing is correct. We praise them to teach them what is socially acceptable.

So when we praise children we are trying to get them to fit into the world by doing what is socially acceptable. And we are attempting to do that through positive reinforcement.

When we praise children we also praise them to encourage them when they are learning something. Learning something new is never easy and failure during the initial phases of any learning process is inevitable. Praising small or partial successes during this phase can be extremely motivating for children. And so – praising children when they are learning something new is essential and commendable

However praise can sometimes get out of hand and it is possible to praise a child too much. And too much praise can be really harmful.

When we constantly hang around a child and praising him for what he has already learnt how to do or for what he knows he must do – we start overdoing the praise.

When a child learns how to do something and understands that he must do a certain thing – we must gradually reduce the praise and eventually stop praising the child for that particular thing.

Always remember. Praising your child is good overdoing the praise is bad

It is a mistake to get your toddler used to too much praise because he is not going to get that when he goes to preschool. At preschool the teacher will only intermittently praise children for doing things right and a child who is used to having all his actions fuelled by praise will begin to feel extremely unhappy

Praise should not become the fuel your child runs on. If praise become the fuel he runs on – your child will feel starved when he doesn’t receive this praise and can end up feeling very unhappy in school.

Don’t allow that to happen. Always use praise judiciously and in moderation

Read the article 6 Ways to help your child settle in Pre-school