Susie O’Brien: Modern praise plague destroying our kids’ resilience

Australia’s top cop says Gen Z needs praise “three times a week” but how will our youth ever learn to confront their own failings if we keep playing the affirmation game?

Every kid who plays sport has a swag of shiny medals proclaiming their prowess or participation in under-12s soccer, or open-level under-8s high jump.

I have a bronze medal from 1979.

It’s for coming third in the under-8s 100m dash at Leigh Creek Area School.

The fact there were only two others in the race didn’t dampen my excitement. I got a medal!

It’s in a box of childhood treasures that includes my set of knuckles made from real bones (the butcher’s son was in my year) and my high school Mars yellow and red certificates for athletics.

The Mars Athletic Star Award was a national athletics competition, with kids receiving one to five stars for competing in a range of events.

I got three two-star certificates and my sister got four with four stars. Yes, of course she did.

I didn’t care that she was better than me. I got a certificate, and it wasn’t one star!

Awards, certificates and medals were thin on the ground for a non-sporty kid whose greatest heights were reaching the softball E and F team in year 12 playing with kids two years younger.

No one was rewarding me for participating, let me assure you.

Compare this with the haul of medals, affirmations, ribbons and pats on the back available to kids these days.

They go to a semester of soccer training and get a certificate for turning up.

They come last and get an award for participation. They do worse than last time and get an encouragement prize.

Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw went rogue during hearings of the Senate Estimates Legal and Constitutional Affairs this week. Picture: Martin Ollman

Every kid who plays sport has a swag of shiny medals proclaiming their prowess or participation in under-12s soccer, or open-level under-8s high jump.

When I was growing up in the 1970s and 1980s, kids knew where they stood – what they were good at and not good at.

Kids like me who weren’t that good at sport knew it and didn’t sweat it. The few shiny things that came our way were prized because they weren’t handed out week after week.

That lonely little bronze medal came to mind when Australian Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw went rogue during hearings of the Senate Estimates Legal and Constitutional Affairs this week.

Delightfully off script, Commissioner Kershaw mused about the need for younger workers to receive lavish praise.

He said that in his experience, members of Gen Z need to be praised three times a week, compared to Millennials who needed praise only “three times a year” and Gen Xers
like him who needed it only “once a year”.

Demographer Mark McCrindle weighed in, affirming the neediness of Gen Z as they had grown up with positive encouragement whereby “every child gets a turn at being player of the week”.

I’d suggest this plague of praise is breeding a generation of kids who have come to expect constant affirmation, even when they put in no effort and do bad jobs.

We are at a point where even praise has to be delivered in the right way, with so-called experts advocating we praise the behaviour, not the child.

This means saying “you did a great job” or “I love how hard you keep trying” rather than “good girl!” or “you’re so smart”.

How are kids going to grow up resilient and strong if they’re never confronted with their own failings? Picture: iStock

I am pretty sure my own dad was too busy wearing budgie smugglers as daywear and concreting things into the backyard to worry about complimenting his daughters in the right way.

It’s ridiculous. How are kids going to grow up resilient and strong if they are never confronted with their own failings? An inflated sense of entitlement is no substitute for good old effort and grunt work.

Of course, this tough love approach doesn’t apply to kids with special needs who need encouragement and praise regardless of their outcomes. But kids who have no reason not to pursue high standards should be clearly confronted with accurate results measuring their efforts.

Ask any parent; it’s now harder than ever to see how your child is really doing because any lack of skill or effort is hidden behind positive affirmations.

Early childhood assessments measure a child’s being, belonging, becoming. Too bad if you want to know about their pencil grip. My son’s school report tells me he usually “actively participates in learning” and sometimes “generates, evaluates and challenges ideas”. Where’s the A-E of school reports in my day?

Where are the certificates revealing the good and bad athletes?

Now, where are those knuckles? I feel like playing a game with winners and losers.

Susie O’Brien is a Saturday Herald Sun columnist