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There are different types of students in the classroom – the ones who seem to lack an effort to involve in the lesson, and those who are dedicated and motivated to work hard to achieve set goals. There are also people who have a natural talent to disciplines and can produce a good result without making titanic efforts, and those who should spend a bit more time to make a better progress. Naturally, we feel the importance to acknowledge student’s success and make a shot out for them, as often we think that this will only motivate them more as a consequence. A lot of teachers praise their pupils in front of others, believing it will make them work harder to keep up and be as successful, but the results of this idea can wary drastically, leading to troubles in the classroom and rejection by peers, or personal struggles on the longer term. Sincere, thoughtful words of acknowledgement, when expressed at the right time and place, possess great power. They can open a road to success and greatly boost self-esteem. It implements the thought that hard work and dedication is the key to success, and efforts are not going to be unnoticed. But there are, of course, exceptions. Quite often a lot of teachers may use praising as a tool for their own interests, such as to strengthen obedience in the classroom, or just praising not for personal achievements, but for something subjective or personal, such as sitting good, tidy desk space, good manners, neat school uniform etc. It is also not uncommon when teachers give compliments for meaningless reasons, such as simply understanding the instructions given for the lesson, and so on. All of this leads to struggles with what is really important in the learning process, and what is not. Continuously using somebody’s personal traits and the way they do something as a thing to praise for, with time, leads to confidence issues, gradually weakening motivation and passion for studying, and in the long term may cause socialization problems. Instead of subjective and therefore, destructive praising, it is much better to give sincere comments regarding detailed academic achievements. It is much easier to say “good job” or “keep it up”, but what really matters is what exactly we appreciate, be it good pronunciation, nicely written part of homework essay or details in a picture they drew, so students know what they good at, and will continue to improve even more in that area. Another important point about constructive praising is to do it without making others feel bad. It is very easy to cross the line between motivational speech and mockery, so the golden rule is to not compare anyone. But if we want to point out at someone’s efforts or errors, it is better to make it in private. So, is it normal to praise students? The answer is yes and no, depending on how constructive the praise is. Sincere, reasonable and encouraging words of appreciation, said at the right time and not as a tool to mock others, will definitely make a positive impact on student’s further achievements.
