The best way to teach is to praise positive actions and ignore negative ones.
Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the statement and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and supporting your position, you should consider ways in which the statement might or might not hold true and explain how these considerations shape your position.
There is no ubiquitous method of teaching that always yields the best results. The “best way to teach” depends largely upon an individual’s disposition; more sensitive students are likely to be discouraged more easily if their negative actions are punished while students of stronger will might thrive on biting criticism. Conversely, more introverted, sensitive, individuals might benefit from being praised for their positive actions while the extroverted, competitive type might take that praise for granted. In short, there is no “best way” to teach. Neither is the best way to teach always to praise positive actions and ignore negative ones, nor is it to favor sharp criticism or punishment for negative actions as opposed to lavishing praise upon positive actions. We might explore some examples throughout the diverse realms of sports, military, and education to see how the Pavlovian ideas of negative and positive reinforcement exist upon a spectrum of equally diverse instances of success.
In the NBA, the coaches of successful teams have demonstrated both disciplinarian styles of teaching as well as those aimed more towards positive reinforcement. Coach of the successful 2000-era Phoenix Suns, Mike D’Antoni was said to have shown game footage during the playoffs that omitted any of the team’s obvious mistakes; instead of showing players failing to switch defensive assignments or easy points scored by the opponents, he would splice together the plays from the game that best exemplified the team’s positive actions working together as a group to outplay their opponents. On the other hand, if one watches the long-time head coach of the San Antonio Spurs, Greg Popovich during a game—a man who has multiple championships—it is not uncommon to see him reprimanding a star-player in front of the whole bench, unleashing streams of vulgar invectives, castigating their negative actions during a specific play. Each coach has formed their own teaching style where positive and negative reinforcement can be seen in direct correlation with the temperaments of their players, and both coaches have proven track-records of success. It might be said that the military methods of teaching are more akin to Popovich, while the contemporary trophy-generation bred in elementary schools and middle schools across the country resemble D’Antoni.
In the military, the severity of action for which soldiers are being trained lends itself to a disciplinarian method of teaching where praise is hardly ever given, and punishment is a fact-of-life. It would be hard to imagine a drill sergeant praising a recruit for holding his gun properly. Instead, soldiers are reprimanded when they fail to follow protocol, the result of which could be—at least during actual warfare—the loss of life. Nonetheless, this narrow focus on punishment has bred a culture of hypermasculinity which often ostracizes the recruits who fail to meet the rigid standards of boot camp. In films such as Platoon, we see one such character—a man who is clearly mentally challenged—become the brunt of all abuse, the result of which is his suicide. At the other extreme of the positive/negative reinforcement spectrum is the contemporary American education system.
Many have come to call the young generation of students who first emerged in the 90s the “trophy generation”. These students expect positive reinforcement and praise for their actions. Even the slightest successes are met with laudatory praise from parents and teachers; “everyone’s a winner”, and everyone gets a trophy for their “participation”. The obvious result of only praising positive actions and ignoring negative ones, is that a child is brought up with the assumption that they will succeed. Some argue that this leads to adverse effects, such as a decline in the child’s competitive instinct. Furthermore, when the child is met with a situation in which a negative action is not ignored, they are subject to such great devastation—as it might be the first time they’ve been told that they were in fact, failing—that their spirits are extinguished. This is the peril which positive-reinforcement advocates face. While students certainly need positive reinforcement and praise, it is not unhealthy to let a student know when their actions are negative. While it might be too extreme to say the “best way of teaching” is ignoring these negative actions completely, punishments should also work towards decreasing the potential that the student might make the same mistake in the future, instead of discouraging them from putting forth scholastic effort at all.
One step in the right direction towards finding the right balance between punishment and praise within the education system—where such positive and negative reinforcement is most influential—is in the move which some schools have made to replace detention with meditation. Of course, this is only one example, but it highlights how, there is no “best way of teaching”, and that neither extreme punishment or unconditional praise are essentially right.
- The best way for a society to prepare its young people for leadership in government, industry, or other fields is by instilling in them a sense of cooperation, not competition.Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree 58
- The best way to teach is to praise positive actions and ignore negative ones.Write a response in which you discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with the statement and explain your reasoning for the position you take. In developing and support 70
Grammar and spelling errors:
Line 1, column 90, Rule ID: THE_SUPERLATIVE[4]
Message: A determiner is probably missing here: '; the best'.
Suggestion: ; the best
...lways yields the best results. The 'best way to teach' depends largely upon...
^^^^^
Line 1, column 609, Rule ID: ADVERB_WORD_ORDER[9]
Message: The adverb 'always' is usually put before the verb 'teach'.
Suggestion: always teach
...s; to teach. Neither is the best way to teach always to praise positive actions and ignore n...
^^^^^^^^^^^^
Line 3, column 103, Rule ID: BOTH_AS_WELL_AS[1]
Message: Probable usage error. Use 'and' after 'both'.
Suggestion: and
... both disciplinarian styles of teaching as well as those aimed more towards positive reinf...
^^^^^^^^^^
Line 6, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...ntemporary American education system. Many have come to call the young generat...
^^^^
Line 7, column 1156, Rule ID: THE_SUPERLATIVE[4]
Message: A determiner is probably missing here: '; the best'.
Suggestion: ; the best
...it might be too extreme to say the 'best way of teaching' is ignoring these...
^^^^^
Line 8, column 1, Rule ID: WHITESPACE_RULE
Message: Possible typo: you repeated a whitespace
Suggestion:
...tting forth scholastic effort at all. One step in the right direction towards ...
^^^^
Line 9, column 352, Rule ID: THE_SUPERLATIVE[4]
Message: A determiner is probably missing here: '; the best'.
Suggestion: ; the best
...but it highlights how, there is no 'best way of teaching', and that neither...
^^^^^
Line 9, column 417, Rule ID: NEITHER_NOR[1]
Message: Use 'nor' with neither.
Suggestion: nor
...s;, and that neither extreme punishment or unconditional praise are essentially ri...
^^
Discourse Markers used:
['also', 'but', 'conversely', 'first', 'furthermore', 'if', 'nonetheless', 'so', 'well', 'while', 'as for', 'at least', 'in fact', 'in short', 'of course', 'such as', 'as well as', 'on the other hand']
Attributes: Values AverageValues Percentages(Values/AverageValues)% => Comments
Performance in Part of Speech:
Nouns: 0.229700854701 0.240241500013 96% => OK
Verbs: 0.15811965812 0.157235817809 101% => OK
Adjectives: 0.113247863248 0.0880659088768 129% => OK
Adverbs: 0.042735042735 0.0497285424764 86% => OK
Pronouns: 0.0320512820513 0.0444667217837 72% => OK
Prepositions: 0.104700854701 0.12292977631 85% => OK
Participles: 0.0534188034188 0.0406280797675 131% => OK
Conjunctions: 3.39571381085 2.79330140395 122% => OK
Infinitives: 0.0245726495726 0.030933414821 79% => OK
Particles: 0.00106837606838 0.0016655270985 64% => OK
Determiners: 0.0982905982906 0.0997080785238 99% => OK
Modal_auxiliary: 0.0160256410256 0.0249443105267 64% => OK
WH_determiners: 0.0224358974359 0.0148568991511 151% => OK
Vocabulary words and sentences:
No of characters: 5215.0 2732.02544248 191% => OK
No of words: 794.0 452.878318584 175% => Less content wanted.
Chars per words: 6.56801007557 6.0361032391 109% => OK
Fourth root words length: 5.3082959231 4.58838876751 116% => OK
words length more than 5 chars: 0.411838790932 0.366273622748 112% => OK
words length more than 6 chars: 0.341309823678 0.280924506359 121% => OK
words length more than 7 chars: 0.24685138539 0.200843997647 123% => OK
words length more than 8 chars: 0.154911838791 0.132149295362 117% => OK
Word Length SD: 3.39571381085 2.79330140395 122% => OK
Unique words: 392.0 219.290929204 179% => OK
Unique words percentage: 0.493702770781 0.48968727796 101% => OK
Word variations: 66.4479512671 55.4138127331 120% => OK
How many sentences: 28.0 20.6194690265 136% => OK
Sentence length: 28.3571428571 23.380412469 121% => OK
Sentence length SD: 88.0922739205 59.4972553346 148% => OK
Chars per sentence: 186.25 141.124799967 132% => OK
Words per sentence: 28.3571428571 23.380412469 121% => OK
Discourse Markers: 0.642857142857 0.674092028746 95% => OK
Paragraphs: 5.0 4.94800884956 101% => OK
Language errors: 8.0 5.21349557522 153% => OK
Readability: 62.4881252249 51.4728631049 121% => OK
Elegance: 1.66513761468 1.64882698954 101% => OK
Coherence and Cohesion:
Essay topic to essay body coherence: 0.443427670752 0.391690518653 113% => OK
Sentence sentence coherence: 0.114769793562 0.123202303941 93% => OK
Sentence sentence coherence SD: 0.0507816635265 0.077325440228 66% => OK
Sentence paragraph coherence: 0.517445902841 0.547984918172 94% => OK
Sentence paragraph coherence SD: 0.14083192695 0.149214159877 94% => OK
Sentence topic coherence: 0.186755552741 0.161403998019 116% => OK
Sentence topic coherence SD: 0.074522898989 0.0892212321368 84% => OK
Paragraph paragraph coherence: 0.474742774465 0.385218514788 123% => OK
Paragraph paragraph coherence SD: 0.0317090684558 0.0692045440612 46% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence: 0.340840325407 0.275328986314 124% => OK
Paragraph topic coherence SD: 0.027509398176 0.0653680567796 42% => The ideas may be duplicated in paragraphs.
Task Achievement:
Sentences with positive sentiment : 16.0 10.4325221239 153% => OK
Sentences with negative sentiment : 9.0 5.30420353982 170% => OK
Sentences with neutral sentiment: 3.0 4.88274336283 61% => OK
Positive topic words: 13.0 7.22455752212 180% => OK
Negative topic words: 4.0 3.66592920354 109% => OK
Neutral topic words: 3.0 2.70907079646 111% => OK
Total topic words: 20.0 13.5995575221 147% => OK
What are sentences with positive/Negative/neutral sentiment?
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Less content wanted. Write the essay in 30 minutes.
Rates: 70.83 out of 100
Scores by essay e-grader: 4.25 Out of 6
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Note: This is not the final score. The e-grader does NOT examine the meaning of words and ideas. VIP users will receive further evaluations by advanced module of e-grader and human graders.