Tools 4 Parents
Common Social-Emotional Challenges For Our Students
And How Parents/Guardians Can Help
A Research Backed Blog by Mrs. Felsher
Perfectionism
The Good, the Bad And What You Can Do
Perfectionism…
Many of our students struggle with this social-emotional issue. Is it something parents need to worry about? A look into the latest research shows that teaching social-emotional skills to our highly able students will help steel them when they battle perfectionism and performance stress (Bushra, 2023). With regard to whether it should be on our list of worries, it is not a simple yes or no answer.
It depends upon whether your child is showing positive or negative perfectionism (Kottman, 2000). Positive perfectionism is about holding oneself to very high standards, whereas negative perfectionism is focused on fears of criticism and worrying about making mistakes (Altun, 2012).
As it turns out, mindset plays a significant role in the discussion. A growth mindset is the belief that with effort, time, and motivation, one can improve upon skills, abilities, and talents. There is a clear correlation between growth mindset and achievement (Mofield, 2019).
Research shows that gifted students tend to feel more pressure than their neurotypical peers (Tsai, 2023) and that this might be the result of asynchronous development among gifted students (Silverman, 1997). To make matters more complicated, higher levels of perfectionism are correlated with clinical levels of anxiety (Maricuțoiu, 2020).
What can you do?
Reframe failure in your home so that it is no longer a dirty word.
FAIL = First Attempt In Learning
This includes getting less than an A.
Many of our students tell me they are terrified to bring a B home, for fear of disappointing you or getting into trouble. This dynamic breeds a fear of failure, less risk taking, and perfectionism (Altun, 2012).
💡Talk about your own mistakes and tendency toward negative self-talk, and your decision to learn and grow from them instead.
💡Work on changing your own negative self-talk and mindset. Talk about it openly and regularly at home.
💡Watch Famous Failures together as a family and discuss how failures and making mistakes help us grow. There are many versions if you search the term.
💡Help your child find both physical and other kinds of outlets to manage stress. Encourage your child to do something physical that they enjoy and outside in nature, daily or as often as possible (Ewart, 2018).
💡Add the word “yet” to the end of a sentence whenever plausible. “I can’t do this…. yet!”
Books to Read Together
or
To Leave Lying About the Home…
*Beautiful Oops by Saltzberg
*Ish by Reynolds
*I Can’t Do That Yet by Cordova and Adiputri
*Help Your Dragon Learn From Mistakes by Herman
*Captain Perfection & The Secret of Self-Compassion by Reeve and Green
*What to Do When Mistakes Make You Quake by Freeland
*The Girl Who Never Made Mistakes by Pett and Rubinstein
*Perfect Ninja by Nhin
*Bubble Gum Brain by Cook
*What to Do When Good Enough Isn't Good Enough: The Real Deal on Perfectionism
What I Do
I provide explicit teaching and practice time within each classroom once per month or more often in support of social-emotional growth. My lesson topics are based upon street data that I gather from the students, their teachers, and from you. I spend hours creating engaging and thought provoking lessons to get the most bang out of my proactive buck! Curious? Here are a few samples of my social-emotional lessons on similar topics:
Other related lessons include mental flexibility, dealing with change, perspective taking and empathy.
You are always welcome to reach out with any questions or concerns. Your information will be kept confidential. Let’s set up a time to talk. It really does take a village… Let me be part of yours.
Warmly,
Loren Felsher
Loren_P_Felsher@mcpsmd.org
References
Bushra, Noor (2023). Pressure and Perfectionism: a Phenomenological Study on Parents’ and Teachers’ Perceptions of the Challenges Faced by Gifted and Talented Students in Self-Contained Classes. Frontiers in Education (8).
Tsai, Min Ying (2023). Comparing Perfectionism, Cognitive Mindset, Constructive Thinking, and Emotional Intelligence in Gifted Students by Grade and Gender. Social Sciences; Children and Youth Studies. 12(4), 23.
Altun, F & Fatih, H.Y. (2014). Perfectionism, School Motivation, Learning Styles and Academic Achievement of Gifted and Non-Gifted. Croatian Journal of Education. 16(4), 1031-1054.
Kakavand, A., Kalantari, S., Noohi, S. & Taran, H. (2017). Identifying the relationship of parenting styles and parent’s perfectionism with normal students’ and gifted students’ perfectionism. Independent Journal of Management & Production. (8)1, 108-123.
Maricuțoiu, L., Măgurean, S., & Tulbure, B.T. (2020).
Perfectionism in a transdiagnostic context: An investigation of the criterion validity of the Almost Perfect Scale-Revised. European Journal of Psychological Assessment. 36(4), 573-583.
Morfield, E. & Peters, M.P. Understanding underachievement: Mindset, perfectionism, and achievement attitudes among gifted students. Journal for the Education of the Gifted, 42(2),107-134.
Ewert, A. and Chang, Y. (2018). Levels of Nature and Stress Response. Behavioral Science. 8(5) 49.
