The Criticism Trap – 80+ Ways to Say “Good For You!” Part 4 of a Series - The Criticism Trap Last time we talked about the Criticism Trap and how important it is to positively reinforce your child or student – Catch’em Being Good! But how do you practice getting better at being positive? How do you expand your own list of praise statements and avoid the Criticism Trap like a pro? Here are 80+ Ways to Say “Good For You!” and how to make them your own! Praise Statements Teachers, parents and coaches need a large repertoire of highly positive praise statements to reinforce their students, children and/or players efforts. These praise statements do not come naturally to most of us. Like everything else we have to learn to accentuate the positive. We need to practice saying good things to children. At first, our statements may sound contrived and insincere to us, but they may sound entirely different to the child. Children need and love attention. If you donât believe that just count the number of times in one hour that your child says your name. One of our major tasks as parents is to provide feedback to our children about their behavior. It is easy to criticize and to belittle a child. Punishment works faster than praise but it comes with a high price. It is much more difficult to hold back the criticism and âcatch the child being good.â Attention is a powerful reinforcer of children’ss behavior, equally powerful whether it is positive or negative. The long-term effects of positive versus negative statements to children are dramatic. It is obvious that we need to focus on the positive, and eliminate the negative. It is also best for the kids. The Criticism Trap – 80+ Praise Statements Many parents, and teachers really, do not have large praise repertoires. They need to increase the number of ways they can say “Good for you!” Here is a list to memorize. 1. Great job. 2. You’ve got it! 3. You are really doing well. 4. You’re very good at this! 5. That’s much better. 6. Sensational! 7. I’m happy to see you work this hard 8. Excellent! 9. You’ve figured it out! 10. Best ever! 11. I knew you had it in you. 12. You get better and better. 13. Great improvement! 14. That was perfect. 15. You make this look easy. 16. Right on! 17. Way to go – nice! 18. Terrific! 19. I like it 20. Awesome! 21. You just mastered that. 22. Keep up the great work. 23. Superb! 24. All right! 25. Outstanding 26. Fantastic effort. 27. Impressive work! 28. You are amazing! 29. You did it! 30. Tremendous! 31. I like working with you. 32. You are really moving ahead! 33. Now you’ve got it! 34. Hot stuff! 35. Best yet! 36. Good thinking. 37. Keep up the good work 38. That is beautiful. 39. You can do this 40. I’m really proud of you! 41. I knew you could get this 42. Cool! 43. That was the best 44. Take a bow! 45. Applause!! 46. Let’s hear it for you! 47. Wow! 48. Excellent effort! 49. Right on the target! 50. You are a star! 51. Magnificent! 52. Nice touch! 53. You are learning so much. 54. You are catching on fast! 55. Look at you go! 56. Magnificent! 57. That’s gotta feel good. 58. You are so smart with this. 59. You are almost there! 60. Whoa, that’s good stuff! 61. How does that feel? 62. Wonderful! 63. Yippee! Woo-hoo! 64. Look at that masterful work! 65. Super effort! 66. Thank you for inspiring me. 67. Good remembering 68. Incredible! 69. Yes! 100%! 70. You are very impressive! 71. You should be proud of your work. 72. I knew you had it in you. 73. It doesn’t get any better than you. 74. Look at that fine work! 75. Marvelous! 76. High five! 77. Congratulations! You did it! 78. A star student is born! 79. Now that is some thorough learning. 80. You are really fun to teach! 81. Outstanding achievement! 82. You’re hard work is really paying off. 83. You have been practicing well! 84. You got it! Nice job! 85. You deserve a medal for this work! 86. You have this figured out. 87. Keep going! You got it! 88. Always a pleasure working with you. 89. Masterful! 90. ________________________ 91. ________________________ 92. ________________________ 93. ________________________ 94. ________________________ 95. ________________________ 96. ________________________ 97. ________________________ 98. ________________________ 99. ________________________ 100. ________________________ The Criticism Trap – Try This! Take this list and put each praise statement on a flashcard. Read the flashcards once each day for 3-5 minutes. Then take a piece of paper and write as many praise statements as you can in one minute. You should be able to write between 20â30 words in one minute. When you have reached that standard, you will be fluent and now you have a larger praise repertoire. Now all you have to do is catch your children being good. Reward improvement. Ignore little deviations and wait for a chance to reward an appropriate behavior. Criticism Trap? What Criticism Trap?? Now you have 80+ Ways to say, “Good for you!” And that means you have 80+ ways… almost a hundred different ways… to get out of the Criticism Trap! Way to go! You are on the way to becoming a star teacher, or a star parent… or a star learner yourself! Bonus: Check out the FREE lessons of the Maloney Method Digital Reading Program. If you can read, you can teach a child to read. CLICK HERE TO LEARN MORE ABOUT OUR DIGITAL LEARNING WITH VIDEO LESSONS AND THE MALONEY METHOD
