Essay On Praise

The form and specificity of praise are important aspects of feedback that pupils receive for their work (Chalk and Bizo, 2004). The definitions of praise in literature vary widely. Woollard (2010) views praise as a positive reinforcement as it’s an encouraging response for behaving according to expectations. I partly agree with this definition because I believe praise is an encouraging response to behaviour but disagree that it’s a response to expected behaviour. As our praise could be a reaction to behaviour we did not expect.

Schunk, Pintrich and Meece (2008) regard praise as positive feedback that expresses commendation or approval. Indicating that answers are correct or behaviour is appropriate. Therefore it’s not simple feedback because it provides information of the worth of pupils’ behaviours and communicates positive teacher affect. Ellis and Tod (2009) argue praise is not positive feedback because praise puts more emphasis on the evaluative element (e.g. ‘fantastic’, ‘well done’, ‘brilliant, etc) where as positive feedback focuses on the descriptive element. Nevertheless, from the perspective of behaviour for learning, to maintain strong links between learning and behaviour, Ellis and Tod do not make a distinction between praise and other forms of teacher feedback. Although praise was just a segment in their investigation of approaches to behaviour management, it’s interesting that they view praise differently when specifically referring to behaviour for learning.

Dweck (2000) identifies the difference between person praise and process praise. Process praise focuses on the effort or approach used and is more specific. The importance of an achievement is acknowledged (e.g ‘You must have tried really hard on this task’), ...

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...earn to use skill and knowledge effectively. Doing this will help the pupil become aware of their own learning (metacognition) and help them to apply skills independently to new learning situations (Price and Douglas, 2011; NCTL, 2006).

Kohn (2001) believes praise given should not make an individual feel manipulated, controlled or encouraged to only depend on someone else’s approval. Instead it should contribute to intrinsic motivation. I concur with Kohn’s opinion that praise should contribute to intrinsic motivation because praise should help pupils through the learning process of building their own judgements of their performance. However, I also agree with Young, (2005) who believe praise used to reprimand pupils is an effective method of managing behaviour. (e.g ‘Sam, you’re the last person I would have thought would interrupt me, you normally listen so well).