I’m definitely not fully there with this article’s advice. I do agree with the idea of being observational, for example, “You put your shoes on by yourself!” so that a child knows what they’ve done that worked well. And I agree with your statement about showing your emotions to children. But I genuinely fail to see how telling kids they’ve done a “good job” is as harmful as they’re making it out to be. I’ve read many articles like it over the past 13 years. When I first became a parent I suddenly became aware of the massive abundance of “parenting experts” and the like, ever ready to weigh in on morning shows and flog a new book or subscription, who were making both a killing and a career on over analysing parenting, scrutinising and nitpicking every detail of parental performance. If I sound a little sensitive on the topic it’s because I really drove myself crazy for those first few years, especially as a first time parent with only self interested family members to advise me, reading every analysis and article I could find in order to do the right thing by my child. I often have told my kids they do a “good job,” and the end result is that they are aware I think they’ve done a good job. Period. It doesn’t create “praise junkies” in the slightest. My daughter especially is a very strong willed, strong minded little girl, but neither of my kids are inclined to give up on an idea just because I think it might not be great. If they are hesitant in answering a question it is because they are uncertain of the actual answer, not uncertain of whether they will receive my praise. If the author’s purpose is to encourage parents in creating children who are strong minded, independent and creative thinkers, more critique of the education systems we employ might be a better use of their time than yet another critique of already beleaguered parents, who are themselves mostly just trying their best to do a “good job.”

Edit to say I didn’t down vote you… would’ve rather that person contributed to the discussion