By Bernadette Rosanski

Although there are times when praise can be encouraging, parents will be most effective if they avoid praising children too often. "Encouragement" helps our children believe in themselves. This is known as "internal gratification." "Praise" such as good, great, better, best, and excellent condition children to look for "external gratification." Praise keeps your child dependent on the authority figure to feel good about himself. On the other hand, encouragement allows your child to focus on how she feels from the inside out. For example: phrases like, "It looks like you enjoyed drawing that picture," rather than "You're a good boy" gives the child responsibility for his happiness rather than looking for someone or something to bring him happiness. Children realize that it is their challenge to do things to make themselves happy. Adults who did not learn this lesson in childhood often disturb relationships later because they expect others to make them happy. Praise can be a disguise for expressing our personal values and opinions. Praise focuses on the person where encouragement focuses on the effort! Through encouragement we are teaching children to look inside themselves for their motivation, for the answers to their questions, and for knowing their purpose and direction. Encouragement has it's own language. Here are some examples of phrases that express encouragement:

• "You seem to like that"
• "How do you feel about it"
• "I need your help on..."
• "What do you think?"
• "Thanks, that helped me a lot"
• "You can do it"
• "You're getting better at..."
• "I like the way you..."
• "You really worked hard on that"