Rich In Thought: Not Every Olympian Gets A Medal Analysis

"Rich in Thought: Not Every Olympian Gets a Medal," is an essay written by Richard Paloma and he talks about the importance of praise, criticism and how achievements affect your self-image. He believes a child's self-image is created by parents, teachers, and society. Parents and teachers shouldn't use false praise to boost a child's self-image. For example, if you lie to a child that they exceed in something that they're not good at, it wouldn't benefit them at all. A mix of positive and negative feedback is a much better alternative. Telling a child what's wrong and how to improve on the matter is called constructive criticism. False praise shouldn't be used to boost self-esteem. Teachers and parents should focus more on giving both positive and negative praise. I don't want teachers to sugar coat praise because I want to hear the truth so I can learn from my mistakes. Negative comments can break my self-esteem, there's not a lighter side to it. In my mind, it's game over with no restart button. Adding positive to negative lightens the criticism a little bit, I can figure out what I did wrong and improve next time. It depends on the person though, I've learned to take constructive criticism well growing up.
Growing up in an Asian household, my parents are very strict, in comparison to other cultures. Praise is like a phantom in my mind. I like to think my parents are very proud of me after I ace a test or a project but it's just a subtle "good job" from them or a nod. I can't tell if it's positive feedback or they're lying to me. They just know that I completed the work regardless of it being bad or good. I don't blame them though, their parents raised them the same way. I don't care what others think of me or my work. At the end of the day, my parent's subtle opinions matter the most in my