Mikayla's Epics of India

  The two sources that resonated the most with me were  Be a Mirror  by Gravity Goldberg, and  Five Reasons to Stop Saying "Good Job!"  by Alfie Kohn. As always, feedback is such an important part of our lives every day. It is both criticism and reassurance that people seek on a regular basis. It is especially important since I am going to be a teacher (in less than a year, oh my gosh) I need to understand the "do's and dont's" of how to give my students proper feedback in the classroom. The article I found most interesting was about why saying good job can be damaging to students, that is something I had never thought of. I am currently a wrestling coach and my vocabulary is mostly "good job" because, positive thinking, right? I know as a student and athlete myself that I was definitely a praise junkie and always was seeking validation about my abilities. Overall, this is the sort of thing I am going to look out for when giving people feedback on ...

       With the current state of the world, it is so easy for me to fall into some serious self-doubt, disdain, and a negative mindset. I have been extremely critical of myself and my achievements in the last few months and I cannot seem to shake that negativity. This is my last semester of course work so I really want to go out with a bang.  Silence the Critical Voices in Your Head  and  Re-wire Your Self-Critical Brain  were the two articles that really stood out to me in terms of motivation and positivity. For feedback, I am really bad at giving critical feedback. I want to be positive to everyone around me and I want to boost people's confidence. But for myself, I am extremely negative. I am critical of my failures and I water-down my success. These two articles really speak to me and I think I need to take more of my own advice. I definitely need help taming my inner critic, as the articles say. I am good at receiving feedback, but sometimes ...