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On a side note: Please remember that teaching your kid to read should come from a place of curiosity from the kid itself. There is likely no advantage from lear

by WA 7y ago

On a side note: Please remember that teaching your kid to read should come from a place of curiosity from the kid itself. There is likely no advantage from learning how to read at an earlier age (than school) [1]. [1]: https://www.otago.ac.nz/news/news/otago006408.html https://www.otago.ac.nz/news/news/otago006408.html

andrei_says_ 7y ago
I’d like to use this opportunity to remind everyone that extrinsic rewards and punishment (withdrawal of rewards is also punishment) kills intrinsic motivation and poisons the relationship destroying trust. In other words if you want you child to stop enjoying an activity, encourage or reward the activity. For more, and a ton of research, see the work of www.alfiekohn.com and more specifically Punished by Rewards.
- mruts 7y ago
  I mean, is this even true? I love programming for example but love it a lot more when I’m being paid a lot of money.
  - laumars 7y ago
    I think the previous poster meant learning should be incentivised with rewards; rather than a behaviour forced because the alternative is punishment.
    - pavel_lishin 7y ago
      > withdrawal of rewards is also punishment
    - andrei_says_ 7y ago
      Incentivizing human beings means treating them like the rats and birds Skinner-ian techniques were derived from. But we’re not rats nor birds and thus such attitude is not effective long term. Apart from being condescending, humiliating, degrading and destructive. Rewarding a child for reading makes them read for the external reward (for someone else) and makes them hate reading even more because of the humiliation and having to go against their own internal compass in order to get something they want. You may say this prepares them for the “real world” of exploitation but maybe 1, truly successful people find ways to include their internal compass in their daily flow career-wise and 2., a society where almost everyone tolls at the whims and pleasure of a very few ought to be questioned (reference the insane levels of inequality worldwide, having a king emperor is not sustainable).
      - laumars 7y ago
        > Incentivizing human beings means treating them like the rats and birds Not at all. Incentivising means to motivate. How many people work because they want money rather than because they like to work? > Apart from being condescending, humiliating, degrading and destructive. You're being a tad over dramatic :) > Rewarding a child for reading makes them read for the external reward (for someone else) and makes them hate reading even more because of the humiliation and having to go against their own internal compass in order to get something they want. The first part might be true in some cases. But the latter part certainly isn't. We might try to take the moral high ground but parents effectively bribe their children on an almost daily basis: "if you eat all your dinner you can have ice cream / chocolate for pudding"; "if you go in the bath now I'll pour extra bubble mixture in"; "if you're a good buy while we are shopping then I'll buy you a magazine / chocolate"; etc. Even just the process of potty training involves giving over-enthusiastic praise every time they use the potty / toilet instead of wetting themselves - effectively rewarding them with gratitude. Children are wilful creatures and, as much as we promote independence, we still have lives we need to manage with chores and other stuff that isn't always fun. Even as adults we manage that by saying things like "if I tidy the kitchen now I'll chill with a glass of whisky and an episode of my favourite show" or "I'll go for a run 3 times a week then reward myself with an ice cream at the weekend"... etc. I used HN as a reward for some really dull work (eg I'll write 10 sprint tickets then read something interesting on HN). Suggesting that the whole concept of a reward system is broken is a massive over-exaggeration. True, rewards can be a broken way of encouragement when used inappropriately but lets not throw the baby out with the bath water (proverbially speaking). > You may say this prepares them for the “real world” of exploitation but maybe 1, truly successful people find ways to include their internal compass in their daily flow career-wise and 2., a society where almost everyone tolls at the whims and pleasure of a very few ought to be questioned (reference the insane levels of inequality worldwide, having a king emperor is not sustainable). I think you're trailing off into a hugely philosophical tangent and one I don't really agree with. Capitalism is largely driven by financial reward - many of the greatest disrupters did so for financial gain (the whole "changing the world" meme is really a more dignified way of saying "we want this product to make us rich"). So you can work for personal rewards without being exploited.
  - jacobolus 7y ago
    Yes, this is confirmed by study after study after study. People perform better at tasks requiring deep thought and creativity when doing them for their own sake, instead of based on extrinsic rewards/punishments.
    - andrei_says_ 7y ago
      Dan Pink’s TED talk on motivation speaks about this: https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation/transcript?... Human beings are complex, love doing interesting (to us) things, love being in the flow, love contributing to others and hate the feeling of being ordered around or obviously manipulated into something we don’t like.
  - andrei_says_ 7y ago
    It’s a bit more complex than this. I highly recommend the book, has a ton of research and cites a lot of the experiments. It’s truly fascinating.
fatnoah 7y ago
>Please remember that teaching your kid to read should come from a place of curiosity from the kid itself. So much this. My son was content to led mom and me read to him for a long time. On a recommendation from a friend, we got "Bob Books" (Stages 0-3) and it opened the world of reading to him. There was a natural progression, it made it seem easy to him, and he developed immense pride in being able to read more and more challenging material. Fast forward a couple years, and interest in reading was waning and getting him to read at all was difficult until we found a series of books that he loved (gothic mysteries by John Bellairs) and that kindled his love of reading. We went from no reading to staying up late to read just one more chapter. He now stays on the lookout for interesting new books.
tathougies 7y ago
What about the advantage of your children knowing to read? I mean I was taught how to read in preschool well before I showed interest, and it let me be interested in books. I don't care if there's no 'advantage'. It gave me personally a few more years to enjoy reading, which is enough.

by WA 7y ago

andrei_says_ 7y ago

I’d like to use this opportunity to remind everyone that extrinsic rewards and punishment (withdrawal of rewards is also punishment) kills intrinsic motivation and poisons the relationship destroying trust. In other words if you want you child to stop enjoying an activity, encourage or reward the activity. For more, and a ton of research, see the work of www.alfiekohn.com and more specifically Punished by Rewards.

mruts 7y ago
I mean, is this even true? I love programming for example but love it a lot more when I’m being paid a lot of money.
- laumars 7y ago
  I think the previous poster meant learning should be incentivised with rewards; rather than a behaviour forced because the alternative is punishment.
  - pavel_lishin 7y ago
    > withdrawal of rewards is also punishment
  - andrei_says_ 7y ago
    Incentivizing human beings means treating them like the rats and birds Skinner-ian techniques were derived from. But we’re not rats nor birds and thus such attitude is not effective long term. Apart from being condescending, humiliating, degrading and destructive. Rewarding a child for reading makes them read for the external reward (for someone else) and makes them hate reading even more because of the humiliation and having to go against their own internal compass in order to get something they want. You may say this prepares them for the “real world” of exploitation but maybe 1, truly successful people find ways to include their internal compass in their daily flow career-wise and 2., a society where almost everyone tolls at the whims and pleasure of a very few ought to be questioned (reference the insane levels of inequality worldwide, having a king emperor is not sustainable).
    - laumars 7y ago
      > Incentivizing human beings means treating them like the rats and birds Not at all. Incentivising means to motivate. How many people work because they want money rather than because they like to work? > Apart from being condescending, humiliating, degrading and destructive. You're being a tad over dramatic :) > Rewarding a child for reading makes them read for the external reward (for someone else) and makes them hate reading even more because of the humiliation and having to go against their own internal compass in order to get something they want. The first part might be true in some cases. But the latter part certainly isn't. We might try to take the moral high ground but parents effectively bribe their children on an almost daily basis: "if you eat all your dinner you can have ice cream / chocolate for pudding"; "if you go in the bath now I'll pour extra bubble mixture in"; "if you're a good buy while we are shopping then I'll buy you a magazine / chocolate"; etc. Even just the process of potty training involves giving over-enthusiastic praise every time they use the potty / toilet instead of wetting themselves - effectively rewarding them with gratitude. Children are wilful creatures and, as much as we promote independence, we still have lives we need to manage with chores and other stuff that isn't always fun. Even as adults we manage that by saying things like "if I tidy the kitchen now I'll chill with a glass of whisky and an episode of my favourite show" or "I'll go for a run 3 times a week then reward myself with an ice cream at the weekend"... etc. I used HN as a reward for some really dull work (eg I'll write 10 sprint tickets then read something interesting on HN). Suggesting that the whole concept of a reward system is broken is a massive over-exaggeration. True, rewards can be a broken way of encouragement when used inappropriately but lets not throw the baby out with the bath water (proverbially speaking). > You may say this prepares them for the “real world” of exploitation but maybe 1, truly successful people find ways to include their internal compass in their daily flow career-wise and 2., a society where almost everyone tolls at the whims and pleasure of a very few ought to be questioned (reference the insane levels of inequality worldwide, having a king emperor is not sustainable). I think you're trailing off into a hugely philosophical tangent and one I don't really agree with. Capitalism is largely driven by financial reward - many of the greatest disrupters did so for financial gain (the whole "changing the world" meme is really a more dignified way of saying "we want this product to make us rich"). So you can work for personal rewards without being exploited.
- jacobolus 7y ago
  Yes, this is confirmed by study after study after study. People perform better at tasks requiring deep thought and creativity when doing them for their own sake, instead of based on extrinsic rewards/punishments.
  - andrei_says_ 7y ago
    Dan Pink’s TED talk on motivation speaks about this: https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation/transcript?language=en https://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pink_on_motivation/transcript?... Human beings are complex, love doing interesting (to us) things, love being in the flow, love contributing to others and hate the feeling of being ordered around or obviously manipulated into something we don’t like.
- andrei_says_ 7y ago
  It’s a bit more complex than this. I highly recommend the book, has a ton of research and cites a lot of the experiments. It’s truly fascinating.

fatnoah 7y ago

>Please remember that teaching your kid to read should come from a place of curiosity from the kid itself. So much this. My son was content to led mom and me read to him for a long time. On a recommendation from a friend, we got "Bob Books" (Stages 0-3) and it opened the world of reading to him. There was a natural progression, it made it seem easy to him, and he developed immense pride in being able to read more and more challenging material. Fast forward a couple years, and interest in reading was waning and getting him to read at all was difficult until we found a series of books that he loved (gothic mysteries by John Bellairs) and that kindled his love of reading. We went from no reading to staying up late to read just one more chapter. He now stays on the lookout for interesting new books.

tathougies 7y ago

What about the advantage of your children knowing to read? I mean I was taught how to read in preschool well before I showed interest, and it let me be interested in books. I don't care if there's no 'advantage'. It gave me personally a few more years to enjoy reading, which is enough.