Feedback Strategies: More Than "Good Job"

Specific feedback is something I have heard about in all of my Music Education courses in some form or another. We are told time and time again that it is not enough to tell our students "good job" or "let's try that again," as teachers, we need to give them a why so that students can nurture good technique and quickly fix mistakes. To continue to develop skills for my future career, I went with two articles that focused on how to give specific feedback to younger children, but this advice applies to giving feedback to others (such as fellow classmates) too.

The first article I read was titled "Preschoolers and Praise: What Kinds of Messages Help Kids Grow?" This article focused of educating parents on why it is so important to give specific feedback to children while they're young and on easy strategies to incorporate specific feedback and praise into your conversations with children. Tactics such as rewording generic praise like "Nice picture" into a specific complement such as "I like how you use blue and yellow in this picture", changing a frustrated child's "I can't do it!" into "I can't do it yet", and sharing stories of how you overcame difficult moments in your own life are all wonderful ways to shape a child's mindset in such a way to encourage creativity and perseverance.

The next article, "Five Reasons to Stop Saying 'Good Job!'" take a more hard-and-fast approach to the evils of non-specific feedback. It argues that statements like "good job" can become a deceptive behavioral manipulation tool, creates children who live for praise, takes away a child's joy at their accomplishments, causes children to lose interest in the tasks that are praised, and reduces a child's future achievements. 

...Wow, that's a lot packed into one small phrase. While I think that the author is on to something, his very assertive tone can come across as insulting to parents. A kinder tone would inspire parents to actually follow the advice he gives instead of feeling ridiculed and ignoring his research.

I think that's a very important balance to strike when giving feedback. Overly kind phrases like "good job" do not encourage continued learning in children, while a biting critique shuts down a learning opportunity. The difference might be subtle, but when an opportunity for growth is on the line, the difference matters.

(A good balance to follow when giving feedback, One Clear Message)