Speaker 1: You're listening to the Weekend Collective podcast from News Talks.
Speaker 1: By next day you get.
Speaker 2: Stanny Buddies Christmas, I give you the next Day Sandy Beach.
Speaker 3: And welcome back to the Weekend Collective. Ah, yes, a
Speaker 3: little bit of wham or just George Michael, I think
Speaker 3: it's wham Last Christmas? Last Christmas? Should I say I
Speaker 3: forgot it was a Christmas song? But of course it's
Speaker 3: got Christmas in the title. Anyway, I forgot. I didn't
Speaker 3: forget it was a Christmas song. I forgot of thinking
Speaker 3: of it when it as a song. When I was
Speaker 3: doing talk bag, I'm thinking what are the good Christmas songs?
Speaker 3: And somebody suggested Last Christmas. I was like, oh yeah,
Speaker 3: a little bit of wham. There we go. Anyway, Welcome
Speaker 3: to the Parents Squad. My guest is he's a psychologist
Speaker 3: at Umbrella Academy and his name is Dougal Sutherland and Google,
Speaker 3: good afternoon.
Speaker 4: How are you you're a term Umbrella well being, Umbrella
Speaker 4: Academy evil? Sorry, Umbrella Academy, I think is like an
Speaker 4: evil corporation in some video game. I believe.
Speaker 3: Oh well, okay, that's not us.
Speaker 4: I can tell you right now there's nothing evil there.
Speaker 4: I'm all good.
Speaker 3: I don't know where academy came from. But anyway, that umbrella,
Speaker 3: sorry about that.
Speaker 4: No, no, I'm going to look up what Umbrella Academy is. Now,
Speaker 4: it was a TV show. It's a TV show.
Speaker 3: Remember that. I think my producer had a senior moment
Speaker 3: and umbrella. She brought up some old memory. I'm going
Speaker 3: to dig into that in the break. I'm going to
Speaker 3: say what. Yeah, anyway, now, what's what's your website and
Speaker 3: your your address for people to get in touch and
Speaker 3: see the work that you do.
Speaker 4: That's a great umbrella dot dot z.
Speaker 3: Dot org dot z. So what we want to talk about? Look,
Speaker 3: it's it's interesting one, isn't it? The whole question, the
Speaker 3: whole question about rewarding kids and giving them a kids
Speaker 3: children awards for achievement and things. And as you will
Speaker 3: have seen that there's a story out about school prize
Speaker 3: givings and a question mark over whether these are good
Speaker 3: or bad for children. And there's that school of thought
Speaker 3: that you know, the well, there's a school of thought
Speaker 3: in both directions, and that somehow if you are not
Speaker 3: the kids who are not getting their award, the awards
Speaker 3: maybe dis disheartened or something, and it sends and anyway
Speaker 3: to me. Obviously, surprise givings have been something that have
Speaker 3: been around when I was at school, and I never
Speaker 3: gave them a second thought. Some kids got prizes and
Speaker 3: some didn't, and I didn't really care about it. But
Speaker 3: is there some sort of deeper sort of pearl clutching
Speaker 3: we can do on this?
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's it is a It is a vexed one,
Speaker 4: isn't it like on a bit like you? I think
Speaker 4: in the end of year prizegiving, the way I see
Speaker 4: it is meant to celebrate the big achievements of the year,
Speaker 4: and I reckon there is a time and a place for,
Speaker 4: you know, singling out people who've done well, whether that's
Speaker 4: academically or sporting or culturally, and that's I think. I
Speaker 4: think it's important that we celebrate that, that we recognize
Speaker 4: people that have done really, really really well, because they
Speaker 4: might not get it a lot otherwise. I think there's
Speaker 4: too a place for awarding kids or recognizing kids who participate,
Speaker 4: but that could I reckon that can be done during
Speaker 4: the year that the prize giving. The prize givings are
Speaker 4: sort of like the award it's a bit of the awards,
Speaker 4: the Academy awards. You don't say, well, everybody can get
Speaker 4: a can get an award, Academy award, can't they? It's like, no,
Speaker 4: there are some that we and we and I don't
Speaker 4: think we should shy away from celebrating that success.
Speaker 3: It's a bit like you know, the maybe there is
Speaker 3: a time when kids. It's like with sporting teams that, yeah,
Speaker 3: the kids catch up with this because you know, things
Speaker 3: like player of the week, and the kids are not dumb,
Speaker 3: and at some stage they become aware that there's a
Speaker 3: bit of a merry go round, that it's such and
Speaker 3: such as turn for player of the week. And as
Speaker 3: soon as you turn into that, you might as well
Speaker 3: not bother ya. I mean in the in the teams
Speaker 3: that I sort of was a parent at I think
Speaker 3: we try to. We may have got there may have
Speaker 3: been kids who got it more than once or more often,
Speaker 3: but and we would always look for a reason that
Speaker 3: that player had got it, so it would have a
Speaker 3: tangible way proving it. But kids are not dumb either,
Speaker 3: are they when it comes to I just got that
Speaker 3: because it was my team.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, I like that kind of you know that
Speaker 4: that approach that you're talking about there around you know
Speaker 4: that there's got to be a reason, like, you know,
Speaker 4: especially you know, I think back I coached kid's cricket teams,
Speaker 4: and some of them, you know, they were I think
Speaker 4: my son started when he was about eight or something
Speaker 4: and played till he was in high school and so
Speaker 4: he got recently good. But you saw a whole lot
Speaker 4: of shapes and sizes and levels of ability and kids
Speaker 4: during that time, and some you know, couldn't catch a ball.
Speaker 4: But if they did manage to start catching a ball,
Speaker 4: that might be something worth celebrating and that, you know,
Speaker 4: but they'd be specifically picked out for that. Hey, you know,
Speaker 4: you really improved in your fielding, which is great, and
Speaker 4: that's something to be celebrated as well.
Speaker 3: I think, yeah, but I think we had move of
Speaker 3: the day as well, because if somebody did something spectacular,
Speaker 3: went for something, even if it failed to be like
Speaker 3: your move of the day was you diving to try
Speaker 3: and catch that ball and they didn't make it, that
Speaker 3: was magnificent and they sort of go, yeah, it's cool.
Speaker 3: I really yeah. Yeah, Because there was a time when
Speaker 3: there was a school of thought, I don't know, who
Speaker 3: where it came from, but where it was almost viewed
Speaker 3: to be a cardinal sin to be selecting kids to
Speaker 3: be celebrated ahead of others and their achievements.
Speaker 4: Have we moved?
Speaker 3: I don't think that this is what the story is about.
Speaker 3: But there are things that you probably shouldn't be rewarding
Speaker 3: kids for. But my take on that would be if
Speaker 3: your child makes their bed and helps with the dishes,
Speaker 3: that's not something we you need a badge for it.
Speaker 3: There should be an intrinsic They should learn to do
Speaker 3: lots of things in life simply because hey, I did that.
Speaker 3: How cool is it?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Look, I think there's some truth in that. I think though,
Speaker 4: that sometimes when you're trying to get a behavior going
Speaker 4: that isn't there, I don't know, making it, let's say,
Speaker 4: making a bed just because you said that that rewarding
Speaker 4: and sort of in strict psychological terms, which is giving
Speaker 4: them something positive and making increasing the chances that they'll
Speaker 4: do it again. That probably is a useful thing, I think,
Speaker 4: And that's so you're not going to rward them forever.
Speaker 4: But if they don't want to do it, or if
Speaker 4: they don't know how to do it, they're not very
Speaker 4: good at doing it, then giving them something afterwards that
Speaker 4: makes the behavior more likely to occur. Again, that's a
Speaker 4: definition of a psychological definition of a reward. I think it's.
Speaker 3: Useful as opposed to here's a lolly or ye over substantial.
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, it's just it's just a recognition and you
Speaker 4: are trying to train a behavior. But I think that
Speaker 4: is different from like a prize giving or or an
Speaker 4: award for participation. Well yeah, one is you're trying to
Speaker 4: get more of a behavior, the other you're recognizing something
Speaker 4: about them. But yeah, I think, I think, I think, Look, yeah,
Speaker 4: going back to that price giving, I really think I
Speaker 4: remember I was I did pretty well at school academically,
Speaker 4: but our school was not the type of school that
Speaker 4: you celebrated being good academic.
Speaker 3: The awards and the price for Latin goes to doogle.
Speaker 4: If only I think they dropped Latin by the time
Speaker 4: I got there, But no, our school was not. There
Speaker 4: was no culture of selling embracing that. And I think
Speaker 4: the only time I ever felt good about my school
Speaker 4: achievement was probably a prize giving once where I got
Speaker 4: a prize and people did clap and celebrate, and I
Speaker 4: was like, oh, okay, once in the year, I feel
Speaker 4: okay about doing well at school, which is a bit
Speaker 4: of a sad in diament on in my high school.
Speaker 4: But that's that's the way it was, and that was
Speaker 4: useful for me. I thought, yeah, I do get recognized
Speaker 4: at some level for doing this in front of.
Speaker 3: Everybody thattually interesting. I got the prize for history when
Speaker 3: I was fifteen, I think, or sixteen or seven. Maybe
Speaker 3: it was seventeen actually, and I don't remember remember feeling anything.
Speaker 3: I sort of like, I don't actually wonder if prizegivings
Speaker 3: are more for the parents in a way, because the
Speaker 3: kids sort of go, yeah, I got this, and they
Speaker 3: sort of wander up and they go cool. I mean,
Speaker 3: I've got a photo of my daughter's at the prize
Speaker 3: giving and they invite them up because they you know,
Speaker 3: it's at a school where they have blistering levels of sess.
Speaker 3: But there's a photo I took where they invite them
Speaker 3: ten up at a time and they're standing there and
Speaker 3: they all look so lum. And when my daughter, our
Speaker 3: daughter's got a couple of awards, and I was thinking,
Speaker 3: maybe the awards more for me, because we were just
Speaker 3: so proud proud of them. Who do you think the kids.
Speaker 4: I definitely think you get that sense of pride as
Speaker 4: a family member and as a parent, and there is
Speaker 4: some I think it and in many ways for kids
Speaker 4: that the awards are often a celebration of that the
Speaker 4: family in a sense, because you know your parents have
Speaker 4: invested a lot. But yes, I guess it's sometimes kids
Speaker 4: can feel a bit embarrassed. Oh my god, I don't
Speaker 4: really want to go with the rest of it in
Speaker 4: the front of the school, and then mom and dad
Speaker 4: are standing there clapping and jeering and the whole rest
Speaker 4: of it. So yeah, probably families getting parents get more
Speaker 4: out of it than than the kids do. I would
Speaker 4: imagine at times.
Speaker 3: We'd love your calls on this about how to get look,
Speaker 3: I don't know, I ask the obvious text question is
Speaker 3: like a prize givings helpful or harmful, But how do
Speaker 3: you get it right when it comes to celebrating success
Speaker 3: versus I don't I think participation awards are probably the
Speaker 3: worst prize you can give to a kid because they
Speaker 3: know they're just being given it for turning up. That
Speaker 3: would be my general rule on it. But I think
Speaker 3: the one that we used to sort of as kids.
Speaker 3: Poor scorn On was that the effort an improvement award?
Speaker 3: But I think these days actually the effort an improvement
Speaker 3: award is probably one of the most significant ones some
Speaker 3: kid who has turned around something. So we'd love your
Speaker 3: calls on this. On eight hundred eighty ten eighty. Do
Speaker 3: you love the prize givings or do you hate the
Speaker 3: fact that they single our excellence and the other kids
Speaker 3: who miss out it just contributes to their sense of
Speaker 3: something inadequacy or something I'm overplaying. I'm overstaining my hand
Speaker 3: on that. But what do you think? Do you like
Speaker 3: prize givings? Are they helpful or harmful? O eight one
Speaker 3: hundred eighty ten eighty text nine to nine till them.
Speaker 3: We'll take a break now and we'll come back with
Speaker 3: your calls if you like. I'd love to hear from you.
Speaker 3: It's eighteen past five news talks he'd be.
Speaker 5: He's saying on a song it is we go along,
Speaker 5: whilcome you glmbo on the name Well in Movado you
Speaker 5: can build a storemat and pretended he has passed round,
Speaker 5: He'll say, are you married? Will send no man, but
Speaker 5: you can do the job. When you're on town letter
Speaker 5: will inspire.
Speaker 3: Ah, Yes, this one's for you. Doogle google Sutherland from
Speaker 3: umbrella dot org. God end z it because I think
Speaker 3: you might have told Tyra and she's trying to make
Speaker 3: up for your company company name wrong. This is a
Speaker 3: bit of Dean Martin, a bit of Christmas.
Speaker 4: Yeah, lovely, isn't it? Classic classic Kroner.
Speaker 3: I like the old of Christmasy crooney stuff.
Speaker 4: It's just yea yeah, I do too. I've got this.
Speaker 4: I've got a cassette tape of a Frank Sinatra Christmas
Speaker 4: Special with Dean Martin coming on as well. It's it's
Speaker 4: it sounds like it's a recording of some sort of
Speaker 4: radio show that they did, but it was a it
Speaker 4: was a different time back then in the fifties.
Speaker 3: Funny thing is he was the one his his his
Speaker 3: sort of persona on stage was the one. He was
Speaker 3: always fond of a drink, but apparently he didn't drink
Speaker 3: very much, and it was Sinatra who drink like for sure. Yeah,
Speaker 3: so they turned the tables on that. Anyway, we're talking
Speaker 3: about prize givings, so let's take your calls on this.
Speaker 3: Eight hundred and eighty ten eighty Daytona. Hello, Hi there, Hello,
Speaker 3: how are you hi?
Speaker 6: Can Yeah, I'm good, Thank you.
Speaker 3: What would you like to share with us about the
Speaker 3: prize givings?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I won the most improved part of a prizegiving
Speaker 6: in high school and it was a bit embarrassing, but
Speaker 6: at the same time that he said that it's an improvement,
Speaker 6: like a something.
Speaker 3: It's true when you got it, what did you Were
Speaker 3: you surprised and were you were you thrilled or were
Speaker 3: you sort of did you sort of.
Speaker 6: Me my cohort, which it just seems like you're you're Yeah,
Speaker 6: it's just not it's kind of looked down.
Speaker 3: How long ago?
Speaker 4: Was that?
Speaker 6: Years ago?
Speaker 3: Okay? Well, and what do you think of it now
Speaker 3: when you look back, or would you would you want
Speaker 3: your family members of yours to get the most improved
Speaker 3: because it's actually pretty good prize when you think of it.
Speaker 6: Yeah, absolutely, I mean that's the means it's an improvement.
Speaker 6: You're stepping up a later.
Speaker 3: Good on it, Good on your thanks for that, Daytona.
Speaker 3: So it's a bit of a bit of a scratchy
Speaker 3: phone line. Then I think Google you might have had
Speaker 3: trouble hearing that that Daytona was saying when she got
Speaker 3: the most Improved awards, she sort of cringed a bit,
Speaker 3: but she's actually quite proud she got it. Looking back
Speaker 3: fifteen years later.
Speaker 4: Yeah, funny, that, isn't it that that when you look
Speaker 4: back on it, go, Actually that was and that's a
Speaker 4: good thing. I reckon, that's really good. You know that
Speaker 4: often in the moment, especially as teenagers, teenagers never like
Speaker 4: to be the center of attention, weirdly because they always
Speaker 4: like to be the center of attention at the same time,
Speaker 4: don't they. But if you put them up up on
Speaker 4: stages like no, no, but actually it does sink in.
Speaker 4: I think Daytona's example sort of showed that it sinks
Speaker 4: in later on.
Speaker 3: I wonder if it depends on the school and the
Speaker 3: sort of community I guess, but I think probably that
Speaker 3: when it came to prize giving, kids who got awards
Speaker 3: for sporting prowess did actually enjoy that. I think we
Speaker 3: are shifting a bit with the appreciating academic success, that
Speaker 3: aren't we.
Speaker 4: Yeah? I think so. My son when he was at school,
Speaker 4: he went to a fairly traditional sort of boys' school,
Speaker 4: and you know Verse fifteen and Blues for cricket, et
Speaker 4: cetera with a thing. But they were really pushing to
Speaker 4: recognize academic excellence and cultural excellence as well. And I
Speaker 4: think that was good because I think sporting always sort
Speaker 4: of gets it. But yeah, the wider and the broader
Speaker 4: you can make it. I think we're going to get better,
Speaker 4: better results if we're if we recognize lots of talents.
Speaker 3: Yeah, what is the I mean, what are the ways too?
Speaker 3: From a psychological point of view, I guess, or not
Speaker 3: from me, you know, just from a human to human
Speaker 3: point of view. But encouraging kids to actually, because there
Speaker 3: are some kids who are motivated by extrinsic things. They
Speaker 3: want to win the prize and they go healthful leather
Speaker 3: for that. I have a daughter who did say when
Speaker 3: she didn't get all the top of prize, she did well,
Speaker 3: but she saw some other girls getting better prizes. I
Speaker 3: actually said to my wife. I've already repeated myself from
Speaker 3: the panel here because I was telling my panelists about this,
Speaker 3: But I said to my wife on the way home,
Speaker 3: I said, I bet you such and such says that
Speaker 3: she might try a bit harder next year because she
Speaker 3: wants to win those prizes. And I was driving around
Speaker 3: and she was in the back seat. She goes, Daddy,
Speaker 3: I might try a bit harder next year's And I said, really,
Speaker 3: why is that? So she's motivated by both, you know,
Speaker 3: her own sense of satisfaction, but she does like the
Speaker 3: extrinsic Yeah.
Speaker 4: Look, I think I think sort of. There are different
Speaker 4: personality styles and there you know, some are really motivated
Speaker 4: by competition and that's great, and some aren't so much
Speaker 4: motivated by competition, and that it just won't quite have
Speaker 4: the same impact the horses for courses. I guess if
Speaker 4: your kid is motivated by that competition, that's probably great.
Speaker 4: They'll probably learn some good lessons along the way. And
Speaker 4: the fact that they can't win all the time, you know,
Speaker 4: they might be I had the experience of going to
Speaker 4: from school to UNI, and UNI is a whole different ballgame,
Speaker 4: and all of a sudden you go, oh, I'm not
Speaker 4: I'm a little fish in a big pool now. But
Speaker 4: that's okay, you can that's that's good learning as well.
Speaker 4: That's good learning. Well.
Speaker 3: I don't know what the stats show in terms of
Speaker 3: the people who become the biggest successes in life, but
Speaker 3: I have a suspicion that it's not necessarily the people
Speaker 3: who rock and roll at school who necessarily turn into
Speaker 3: the biggest successes. I would have thought, in fact, for
Speaker 3: kids who this is what This is why I think
Speaker 3: if you're a naturally talented, gifted child, that the the
Speaker 3: prizes that might flow when you actually haven't much if
Speaker 3: it don't necessarily serve you that well do they?
Speaker 4: Yeah? No, It goes back to your point around you
Speaker 4: know that the prizes for most improved or people that
Speaker 4: have developed the most, because that's rewarding some real hard
Speaker 4: graft there isn't it, rather than a sort of just
Speaker 4: oh I can do this naturally. Yeah?
Speaker 3: How what is the best way to I mean? And
Speaker 3: what this all really comes back to us. We all
Speaker 3: want our kids to do well. This is not about,
Speaker 3: for me, the final year of prize giving. It's about
Speaker 3: their journey through school and recognizing effort. But what do
Speaker 3: we know about the things that actually will motivate children
Speaker 3: to do their best and to enjoy success?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 4: Well, I think the school So if we look at
Speaker 4: think about the school, school systems are moving and have
Speaker 4: been for quite a way now, moving away from that
Speaker 4: sort of final exam, the exam being the big thing,
Speaker 4: and there's lots of recognition throughout the year because there's
Speaker 4: lots of opportunities for people for kids to do work
Speaker 4: throughout the year, and university is definitely moving to that
Speaker 4: as well. So I think that is quite helpful for
Speaker 4: a number of kids who because it rewards that kind
Speaker 4: of continual effort rather than maybe a big push at
Speaker 4: the end. And I think that's probably useful for most
Speaker 4: kids really, that that you know, you could you could
Speaker 4: smash it towards the end of the year and get
Speaker 4: a big prize, but actually slow and steady wins the
Speaker 4: race and you're probably building up a whole lot better
Speaker 4: skills if you're awarded throughout the year just for small
Speaker 4: successes rather than waiting for one big one at the end.
Speaker 3: Is that something you really can make an influence influenced
Speaker 3: kids on because there's a part of me that wonders
Speaker 3: whether they are always going to be the ones who
Speaker 3: are slow and steady and do well and that's set,
Speaker 3: you know, that's set in their first few years of
Speaker 3: life really, and the ones who are always going to
Speaker 3: be the late ones who cram and you know, don't
Speaker 3: put the effort in, but then cram and Cram and
Speaker 3: Kram and Cram that's also a personality type. Can how
Speaker 3: much can you change the asse?
Speaker 4: Yeah? I think you can change those essentially. Sure. I
Speaker 4: think we have tendencies to be one or the other,
Speaker 4: you know, a crammer or a slow and steady throughout
Speaker 4: the year. But I think most people have got their
Speaker 4: ability to be changed and shaped a little bit. And
Speaker 4: you probably need to because you're going to go into
Speaker 4: a life and a workforce that you need to be
Speaker 4: a bit adaptable to. But it's definitely changeable. I think.
Speaker 4: I think very few traits psychologically are kind of set
Speaker 4: and fused from day one and can't be changed. Where
Speaker 4: we have lots of impact by what goes on around us,
Speaker 4: or we're impacted lots by what goes on around us.
Speaker 3: Do you remember what I used to motivate you? That's cool?
Speaker 2: I was.
Speaker 4: I think it was the intrinsic motivation of I did
Speaker 4: well on a on a exam, or not even exam,
Speaker 4: but you know, did well on an assignment, and and
Speaker 4: that was good for me because but because I was
Speaker 4: good at it anyway, it was sort of reinforced for
Speaker 4: me that this was something I was good at, and
Speaker 4: so but I did have to keep it quiet. I
Speaker 4: could share with my parents, but I did shit with
Speaker 4: my classmates. I would quickly look at my marking class
Speaker 4: and then quickly put it in my bag so that
Speaker 4: nobody else saw it.
Speaker 3: Really, Oh my goodness, you really were Did you get
Speaker 3: picked on at school or something for being the clever kid?
Speaker 4: I didn't get picked on, but I avoided that by
Speaker 4: having a very smart mouth. And so because I could
Speaker 4: see that, I could see that was going to come
Speaker 4: if I didn't say something, I was going to get
Speaker 4: picked on for being a nerd. So I developed a
Speaker 4: cutting sense of humor, which in hindsight was probably relatively cruel.
Speaker 4: When I was at school, I.
Speaker 3: Think, oh, oh, well, yeah, that's look, it's you know,
Speaker 3: it's survival. At school it felt a bit like that
Speaker 3: Sutherland sort of, you know, in a position of power
Speaker 3: and then you're just trying to keep your head above water,
Speaker 3: won't you.
Speaker 4: Yeah, I was at that stage. You're looking back, it
Speaker 4: would have been nice to have done things a little
Speaker 4: bit differently, but yeah, as you say, it was a
Speaker 4: bit of survival and the fittest in the in the
Speaker 4: mid eighties at high school.
Speaker 3: Yeah, few texts here one says, I got to run
Speaker 3: award at my school prizegiving for the amount of money
Speaker 3: I raised throughout the year. When I was walking back
Speaker 3: after receiving my award, I overheard parents mocking the rotary
Speaker 3: award I got and saying they'd glad their kids got
Speaker 3: a better award. Uh, definitely, at least partly for the parents,
Speaker 3: or at least to make their parents proud.
Speaker 4: What the.
Speaker 3: Well, that's just a that's just an indictment on stupid parents,
Speaker 3: isn't it that stupid people?
Speaker 4: Yeah, it's it's yeah, it's it's that. That does sound
Speaker 4: like there's a whole lot of judginess going on and
Speaker 4: a weighing up of it. Sounds to me like there
Speaker 4: are too many prizes almost being given out of people
Speaker 4: are starting to compare a levels of prizes. You know,
Speaker 4: that sounds it sounds pretty nasty. Really it's yeah.
Speaker 3: Actually, just out of curiosity, from a historical point of view,
Speaker 3: we have come a long way. I just thought it's
Speaker 3: worth pointing out. I wondered whether the dunce hat was
Speaker 3: actually ever a real thing, But dunce hats were used
Speaker 3: in schools in Europe, and this is the opposite of
Speaker 3: the prize giving. Yeah, yeah, when literally if you'd done something, oh,
Speaker 3: if you weren't doing very well or whatever. I don't
Speaker 3: know why people got the dunce hat, but actually was
Speaker 3: a thing, wasn't it a tall pointed hat used as
Speaker 3: a form of punishment for children. Did you know about
Speaker 3: the dunce I.
Speaker 4: Didn't know that it was. It was a real thing,
Speaker 4: you know. I'd heard about a dunce cap, but I
Speaker 4: didn't really realize it was a real thing. I think, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: the gosh, that's really old school, isn't it. Let's punish
Speaker 4: you in to try and to achieve better. That'll work. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 4: but it's interesting that it was a real thing.
Speaker 3: Of course, these days, if there was such a thing
Speaker 3: as a dance cap, it would probably be used and
Speaker 3: turned in social social media as some sort of badge
Speaker 3: of honor, wouldn't it.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, well that's yet. And to be fair, there's
Speaker 4: probably social media dunce caps that people are inadvertently given.
Speaker 4: I would imagine.
Speaker 3: Yeah, a few more texts, Haim. Oh, it's touching on
Speaker 3: a couple of subjects we touched on. Hay, Tim, I
Speaker 3: got the History in Latin prize at school too, and
Speaker 3: I turned out, Okay, that's from Rosie. If you have
Speaker 3: earned it, you should probably be able to get a
Speaker 3: reward for your efforts. In the normal world, there are
Speaker 3: no free lunches, And I think that's really the point,
Speaker 3: isn't it. Trying to find that balance on rewarding kids.
Speaker 3: Is that life? I mean, obviously you want to shelter
Speaker 3: kids from the reality is of adult life and prepare,
Speaker 3: but you also need to prepare them for it, won't
Speaker 3: you when it comes to, you know, rewarding success as
Speaker 3: opposed to turning up.
Speaker 4: And I think that's what we're going to look at
Speaker 4: what you're rewarding. Sure, you can reward success, but also
Speaker 4: you might reward really hard work and hard graft because
Speaker 4: we know that that will get you a long way
Speaker 4: as well. So yeah, if you can have a variety
Speaker 4: of rewards, that's that's that sounds like a good thing.
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, let's take some more calls.
Speaker 7: Josh, Hello, Yeah, hey guys, good afternoon.
Speaker 3: How you doing, not bad?
Speaker 7: Hey, I'm just thinking about how you could possibly, you know,
Speaker 7: create get the behavior won out of somebody by rewarding
Speaker 7: them for doing the right thing. So, like I actually
Speaker 7: got an attendance ward when I.
Speaker 4: Was a kid.
Speaker 7: Low and a teacher talked to me about it and
Speaker 7: he's just kind of like, hey, man, what's up with
Speaker 7: your attendants? And at the end of the year, I
Speaker 7: got an attendance ward and how did you find out?
Speaker 7: I thought that was good. I mean obviously reinforced you know,
Speaker 7: attendants and made me think about attendants.
Speaker 3: Were you sort of just just taking a sideway step
Speaker 3: at the school gate up until that point.
Speaker 7: No, Actually, like the picture was bigger than that. But
Speaker 7: I think that the teacher was smart enough to know
Speaker 7: that if he made it my concern and awarded me
Speaker 7: for doing my best and showing up, that you know,
Speaker 7: it was something worth worth achieving for me as as
Speaker 7: an individual. Like it wasn't something everybody got. But the
Speaker 7: way the teacher worked it was he sort of primed
Speaker 7: me to be mindful of attendance and then reinforce the
Speaker 7: award for you know, actually trying to work on it
Speaker 7: as much as I could.
Speaker 3: Because that seems Josh and Dogle that chipping on this
Speaker 3: is it. That's also a teacher who is speaking to
Speaker 3: an individual student according to something that they see needs
Speaker 3: to be.
Speaker 4: It's a great I think it's a great example of
Speaker 4: how you can really use a reward or an award
Speaker 4: in this case to actually shake the behavior that you want.
Speaker 4: As Joshua was saying, that, you know, you move somebody
Speaker 4: who's perhaps not attending very much into somebody who's, Ah,
Speaker 4: there's something to achieve out of being here all the time,
Speaker 4: and there'll be a whole lot of extra benefits that
Speaker 4: you get from being at school all the time that
Speaker 4: probably weren't rewarded. But yeah, great, great insight from the teacher.
Speaker 3: Did you get that reward publicly, josh or did you
Speaker 3: just get yeah?
Speaker 7: Yeah, I did, actually yeah, yeah, as in a period
Speaker 7: we were I was at one school and then we
Speaker 7: moved somewhere for six months and then came back and
Speaker 7: there was a few yeah, just resettling and all that
Speaker 7: sort of cown. But no, I could give other examples
Speaker 7: of that same teacher who yeah, really helped me with.
Speaker 3: Was that teacher quite a special? Was that teacher quite
Speaker 3: a special teacher? Do you think when you look back,
Speaker 3: When you.
Speaker 7: Look back, when you look back and your whole education,
Speaker 7: there's probably three teachers that I would have in my
Speaker 7: mind as profound, really good educators and this guy was
Speaker 7: one of them. Definitely.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, you're very lucky. Actually, Josh, I think to
Speaker 3: have I mean, I think most people to have had
Speaker 3: three that you look back on and thanks for your
Speaker 3: core mate. I appreciate it because I think it's I
Speaker 3: think at some stage in your education, every kid needs
Speaker 3: just needs that one teacher, even if it's just that
Speaker 3: one year, and everyone remembers it that. I mean, for me,
Speaker 3: it was mister Paul when I was eight years old.
Speaker 3: He made us feel ten feet tall. He made us
Speaker 3: think if we cracked a joke, that we were funny.
Speaker 3: He had a ladder for the Times tables where we
Speaker 3: challenged each other, we had fun at class. We absolutely
Speaker 3: we loved him because he just made us feel like
Speaker 3: we were also and I'll never forget it.
Speaker 4: Yeah, No, I'm the same had. I think mine was
Speaker 4: mister McHugh and Form seven. He was an English teacher
Speaker 4: and he just he just made education come alive and
Speaker 4: he got me interested in psychology. Actually I had been well,
Speaker 4: I did go after union do law, but I did
Speaker 4: psychology at the same time because of his influence. I mean,
Speaker 4: he told us a whole lot of sort of myths
Speaker 4: about it. Well, he thought they were true, so they
Speaker 4: turned out to be lies. But putting that aside, he
Speaker 4: was the one who got me interested in what.
Speaker 3: Turned out to me lies.
Speaker 4: Well, things like did you know did you know that
Speaker 4: we only use ten percent of our brain? Oh? Wow,
Speaker 4: Well I want to go and learn about the brain.
Speaker 4: But he was very motivational and it got me interested
Speaker 4: in psychology. And I wouldn't have been interested in that,
Speaker 4: I don't think without him. So it's yeah, I think
Speaker 4: it is great to have those one or two people
Speaker 4: who really make that difference.
Speaker 3: Yeah, all right, we might take quick break. We've got
Speaker 3: some more calls to come to and we'll be back
Speaker 3: in just a moment. News Talk said be talking about
Speaker 3: prize givings and motivating kids and what's the best way
Speaker 3: to do it. It's twenty two minutes to sick.
Speaker 4: Well way up north Worthy.
Speaker 3: Ergis called There's a Tale about Christmas that.
Speaker 5: You Love Me? Yeah.
Speaker 3: That sounds like the Beats Boys a bit, doesn't it,
Speaker 3: But I don't know if it is. But you can
Speaker 3: tell this a Christmas song up from the lyrics because
Speaker 3: there are sleigh bells in the background. You can turn
Speaker 3: any Christmas song into a Christmas song any song into
Speaker 3: a Christmas song by adding sleigh bells. Anyway, my guess
Speaker 3: for the parent squad is Doogle Sutherland. And I've got
Speaker 3: to say, by the way, you know how we got
Speaker 3: the title the second part of your company wrong when
Speaker 3: we said umbrella something the wrong description. I did get
Speaker 3: some texts and somebody highlight highlighted to us there's an
Speaker 3: umbrella corporation in the game Resident Evil. Yes, yes, that's
Speaker 3: not your umbrella. Got in z.
Speaker 4: Let's get the right umbrella.
Speaker 3: Not anyway. Hey, actually, by the way, just on the
Speaker 3: attendance thing rewarding intendans, quite that's the call from Josh
Speaker 3: before I cynically, I sort of think, Gosh, in a way,
Speaker 3: you always wonder whether it'd be worth having attendance awards
Speaker 3: for the for the staggering levels of non attendants from kids.
Speaker 3: But actually which is a serious issue just getting children
Speaker 3: to school. But I was just noticing, I was thinking, actually,
Speaker 3: hang on a minute, So I do. I do a
Speaker 3: language learning app called Duo Lingo, which many people will
Speaker 3: do well will know about, and they have a learning
Speaker 3: streak sort of thing where you actually it does flashes
Speaker 3: up little stars like hey, you're on day six hundred
Speaker 3: and ninety nine today and it keeps me going because
Speaker 3: I don't learn that lose that learning streak.
Speaker 4: So there is yeah, definitely, there's something in.
Speaker 3: The participation stakes, isn't there.
Speaker 4: Well, And that's what they call gamification, isn't it, and
Speaker 4: making So it's creating some sort of game like rewards
Speaker 4: into a learning process. And they try to use them
Speaker 4: on a lot of apps, but for an exact reason
Speaker 4: to get people to keep using them, because one of
Speaker 4: the difficulties with apps is that people stop using them.
Speaker 4: And so if you can gamify it and people get rewards,
Speaker 4: and you know, you think about even it's not a
Speaker 4: great example, but you think about the poking machines and
Speaker 4: the rewards that people get from the flashlights and being
Speaker 4: bing bing bing. We get a bit of a dopeing
Speaker 4: hit from that, we get. Yeah, you get a little
Speaker 4: bit of a dope mein hit from the from the
Speaker 4: duo Lingo app as well, just.
Speaker 3: The Who's educational But it is just because they want
Speaker 3: my yearly subscription when it rolls around.
Speaker 4: I hate to say that that might be part of it. Yeah,
Speaker 4: I think I don't think they're doing it out of
Speaker 4: a charitable cause, probably, but it does work. It's you know,
Speaker 4: if we get that's the and that goes back to
Speaker 4: that psychological sense of what a reward is. It's something
Speaker 4: that you get after the behavior that makes it more
Speaker 4: likely that the behavior will occur.
Speaker 3: Again, it's the intrinsic there's the intrinsic side of learning. Obviously,
Speaker 3: I'm learning French because I want to be able to
Speaker 3: speak it better, and That'll be the intrinsic reward. But yeah,
Speaker 3: it's it's a bit of both, isn't it.
Speaker 4: Well, it's a long time before you might get the
Speaker 4: reward from actually speaking French fluently, and so you probably
Speaker 4: need something to keep you and keep going. Like even
Speaker 4: Josh's example of one hundred percent attendance at school or
Speaker 4: attendance at school he did well to last until the
Speaker 4: end of the year. I think a lot of kids
Speaker 4: would have probably gone, oh, that's far too long. So
Speaker 4: that if we can get little rewards along the way,
Speaker 4: that will help and then there might be one big
Speaker 4: thing at the end.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, so does is there is there a way
Speaker 3: an education to give those dopamine hats though? So, I mean,
Speaker 3: is that a legitimate form of encouragement those.
Speaker 4: Well, yeah, I mean you get it anyway. That's the
Speaker 4: kind of intrinsic reward. The feel good is the dope
Speaker 4: meine hit. The difficulty with dopamine and that sort of
Speaker 4: intrinsic reward is that it's a bit morally neutral, so
Speaker 4: that you can get a you can feel good about
Speaker 4: doing anything. It doesn't necessarily mean it's it's the thing
Speaker 4: that we want you to do. You feel good about
Speaker 4: pulling the you know, punching the buttons on a poking machine.
Speaker 4: That does doesn't actually mean that we want you to
Speaker 4: do that behavior. As a society. Much more you can
Speaker 4: get You can get a dopamine hit or a reward
Speaker 4: intrinsic reward from getting out of something that you don't
Speaker 4: want to do. So it's the intrinsic reward is great,
Speaker 4: but you can get it for many many reasons, not
Speaker 4: just necessarily the things that we want you to be doing.
Speaker 3: Okay, here's a text challenging the prize giving thing, but
Speaker 3: says the whole problem is the fact that kids absolutely
Speaker 3: know it is important to you. Their parents subtle, subtlety,
Speaker 3: subtenly giving them subliminal messages. As you're refair to prize
Speaker 3: giving or the kids that come first in these things.
Speaker 3: Then you start to raise kids who want to please parents.
Speaker 3: Parents should keep out of it, but they just don't. Therefore,
Speaker 3: I'm against prize giving as it muddies the water of
Speaker 3: working hard because the child themselves want it, wants to
Speaker 3: for their own benefit, not for the benefit of the parent.
Speaker 3: By the way, as a school prefect receive prizes and
Speaker 3: now teacher, I just don't think prizes should Prizes should
Speaker 3: motivate hard work or natural ability. We're all born with
Speaker 3: different abilities. Once you leave school, it doesn't matter. A
Speaker 3: lot of damage is done to those who get them
Speaker 3: at school. I'm not much sure I agree with all that.
Speaker 4: But I'm not cult sure I do either. I mean,
Speaker 4: I think a lot of us will do things because
Speaker 4: it helps and we get recognized by other people and
Speaker 4: it brings it might bring positive you know, pride to
Speaker 4: our families or to our or when we're in the workplace,
Speaker 4: to our workplace. But I think, yeah, different ones of
Speaker 4: us will be motivated by Some will be really intrinsically
Speaker 4: motivated to get that reward some of it. Some of
Speaker 4: us will work hard because it helps other people and
Speaker 4: it reflects well on our bigger family or our bigger
Speaker 4: the group.
Speaker 3: That we belong to.
Speaker 4: And I think that's all right too. Now I'm not
Speaker 4: sure I fully agree that it should only be for
Speaker 4: our own individual reward and success that I think there
Speaker 4: are other reasons that we might get rewarded or might
Speaker 4: feel rewarded.
Speaker 3: To imagine, if you went to a high school, like
Speaker 3: if there was a charter school that was all based
Speaker 3: on zen, they definitely wouldn't have a price, they wouldn't.
Speaker 4: It reminded me of my daughter's school used to have
Speaker 4: in the old days before COVID. They used to have
Speaker 4: an award for one hundred percent attendance, so if you
Speaker 4: went every day of the school year, and they quickly
Speaker 4: ditched that after co because they realized that kids were
Speaker 4: coming along sick and it was a great way of
Speaker 4: spreading the flu around because they really some kids really
Speaker 4: wanted to get the one hundred percent attendant award. So
Speaker 4: that one's gone now, which I think is probably a
Speaker 4: useful thing to have dropped.
Speaker 3: As soon as you mentioned the one hundred percent attendants award,
Speaker 3: I thought, I actually thought for you said, and I thought,
Speaker 3: I'll bet you that went by the way, So I
Speaker 3: wouldn't COVID hit and of course, yeah, it's never too
Speaker 3: far from from our from our thoughts. Hey Google, thank you,
Speaker 3: thanks so much for your time this year. We can
Speaker 3: get you back on as as one of our guests
Speaker 3: on the On the Parents Squad for next year as well.
Speaker 4: Yeah, thanks Tim. It's it's it's always and time flies.
Speaker 4: I find it's a great time and just chatting over
Speaker 4: a few issues and yeah, time flies and it's it's
Speaker 4: that time again. So yeah, thank you. It's been great.
Speaker 3: Are you having Are you taking a little bit of
Speaker 3: time off?
Speaker 4: Yeah, taking a few weeks off, going to Alexandra, to
Speaker 4: my wife's family for a week or so, and then
Speaker 4: going to Auckland because my son and his partner are
Speaker 4: expecting a baby.
Speaker 3: Oh oh my godness. Yeah, Otherland, my grandfather.
Speaker 4: Oh yeah, we haven't. Yeah, I'm not. I haven't quite
Speaker 4: warmed up to that to that yet.
Speaker 3: Well, I'm sure on your website umbrella dot org dot
Speaker 3: n z it's got some advice for dealing with some
Speaker 3: of the big life changes that are getting your way.
Speaker 4: I'm going to have to take my own advice, I think,
Speaker 4: aren't I.
Speaker 3: Well, you're looking very young, grandfather and We appreciate your
Speaker 3: time this year. Merry Christmas.
Speaker 4: Yeah, thanks to Merry Christmas too as well.
Speaker 3: Mateas here, we'll be back shortly. Andrew Ordison is at
Speaker 3: the Cricket and he's he'll be here to wrap sport
Speaker 3: with us in just a moment. News Talks will be
Speaker 3: eleven minutes to six.
Speaker 1: For more from the Weekend collective, listen live to News
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