Bullying receives a lot of press, especially schools adopt anti-bullying programs and states pass anti-bullying laws. Witnessing school shootings that were, in part, retaliation for relentless bullying may have increased our empathy toward both bullies and their targets, as well as our motivation to change. But tragic events, additions to curricula, and press coverage have all made it seem as if bullying is new. It might surprise you to learn that camping professionals have been taking a systematic, proactive role in preventing bullying since the 1929.  That year marked the publication of Camping and Character: A Camp Experiment in Character Education.

In Camping and Character, authors Hedley Dimock and Charles Hendry reported on the results of a multiyear study conducted at Camp Ahmek in Ontario. The study sought to uncover the changes evidenced in campers’ behavior during six weeks at camp, and to understand the mechanisms behind those changes. Among the more than 50 behaviors the authors tracked was bullying. Dimock and Hendry recognized that even small increases in bullying behavior needed to be addressed by the camp leadership. They were also encouraged by huge increases in many prosocial behaviors in youngsters. My favorite is: “Making friendly approach to [an] unlikable boy.”

Nearly 80 years later, what are the most important things we’ve learned about bullying? The answer has four parts. First, bullying itself is only half the picture. For every bully, there is at least one target. Second, bullying is cyclic. A recent study by the Center for Disease Control confirmed that about three quarters of bullies are also targets and about three quarters of targets turn around to bully another child. Third, bullying is social. Antisocial, to be sure, but it represents a dynamic, complex, interaction whose origins lie in unhealthy relationships.   Therefore, the solutions lie not in simple punishment, but in the formation of healthy relationships. And finally, there are often bystanders; onlookers who have the power to say something. “Hey, that’s not cool” or “Dude” or “Lay off” or “C’mon” are examples of benign-sounding comments that have the power to derail nascent bullying.

Camps are uniquely suited to deal with bullying because they are such healthy social environments. At camp, leaders supervise children and have opportunities to educate bullies and targets. Leaders can teach the kinds of prosocial behaviors Dimock, Hendry, and their pioneering predecessors saw so often at camps. This is easier to do than most people think, partly because bullying is so often a misguided attempt to make a social connection. If you can teach a bully how to make a social connection without using coercion, threats, or violence, you have actually met that child’s needs instead of simply punishing his or her misbehavior.

Specifically, camps help children in the following ways:

• By having the camp staff set a sterling interpersonal example for all children to follow.

• By seeing beyond the bully alone and including his or her target, plus any bystanders, in an intervention.

• By strengthening bullies’ fragile sense of themselves by providing opportunities for authentic achievement and human connection in various athletic or artistic domains.

• By teaching bullies to make social connections through healthy interaction. We all want to belong to a group…it’s just the bullies go about it in antisocial ways.

• By teaching targets to stand up to bullies in ways that makes bullying unrewarding.

• By setting, early and often in the camp session, strict guidelines for kindness and generosity…and then heaping on the praise when staff witness prosocial behaviors.

• By providing the kind of close supervision that allows both bullies and targets to replay unacceptable or unassertive interactions under the guidance of experienced adult staff.

• By deliberately creating a culture of caring that is perhaps different from school or the neighborhood at home…and then immersing children in that culture.

• By allowing positive peer pressure to exert itself such that children feel appreciated and rewarded for gentleness, honesty, kindness, and unselfishness.

Camps are not a bullying panacea. Outside of camp, there are powerful forces, such as violent media, that infuse children with the notion that violent, even lethal solutions to vexing social problems are both effective and glorious. Nevertheless, camp is a powerful, positive force for change.  Educating bullies, targets, and bystanders is just one of the many ways camp enriches lives and changes the world.

So next time you’re talking with a parent about how your camp handles bullying, provide a better answer than “We don’t tolerate bullying.” Instead, explain how your staff is trained to help children make friends. That is the single best way to prevent antisocial behavior. Give everyone a sense of belonging.

Then, explain how you use a combination of pre-season online training and in-person on-site training to train your staff to spot bullying, teach prosocial behaviors, encourage bystanders to be “upstanders,” and give opportunities for bullies to make amends.  One of the best online training options is ExpertOnlineTraining.com which includes a library of video training modules that I created for summer camp staff and youth development professionals.

There will always be some kinds of egregious misbehaviors that require expulsion from camp, but most instances of bullying are below this safety threshold. Showcase the strength of your camp by outlining how well prepared your staff is to prevent bullying and respond thoughtfully when it occurs.

The tastiest mouthful of any pizza is the first bite of the first slice. You’re hungry. You’ve been anticipating that mouthwatering goodness for an hour or more. Your taste buds are eager and alive. All this perfect pre-pizza preparation transforms ordinary melted mozzarella and pedestrian pepperoni into a sumptuous symphony of gustatory glory.

Ok, it’s not exactly the 4th of July in your mouth, but that first bite of a well-made pizza is pretty tasty. What’s wrong with a little hyperbole when you’re talking about happiness, right? Nothing, really, except that pleasures are short-lived. And they have a satiety point. It is possible to have too much of a good thing. Therein lies the value in distinguishing between what positive psychologists call “pleasures” and “gratifications.”

As we all know, the yumminess quotient for pizza (a pleasure) begins to diminish after that first slice. You may help yourself to another couple slices, but if someone forced you to keep eating, even the hungriest among us would eventually experience eating pizza as aversive. Indeed, if you were forced to woof down several large pizzas, you’d eventually throw it all up. There’s an image we could all do without. But it’s a powerful reminder of the limits to pleasure.

Gratifications, on the other hand, never turn the corner from enjoyable to excruciating. If you hold the door open for someone who is carrying an armload of books, your act of kindness feels good. If another person needs a hand a few minutes later, your unselfish assistance feels just as good. At no point would you say—to that 10th person who needed help—“I’m sorry. I’ve done so many acts of kindness today that I feel nauseated. I’m literally sick of helping.” Holding the door for someone is therefore quite different from eating pizza. There is no satiety point for gratifications, such as unselfish behavior.

What do we do now, armed with a new understanding between pleasure and gratification? According to research, both make contributions to happiness. But because gratifications have no satiety point, they make more reliable contributions to our well-being and the well-being of others than do pleasures. No surprise there. What might surprise you is what research suggests is the most powerful form of gratification: Tapping into one of your signature strengths in service to others.

Here are the 24 character strengths that exist across cultures:

Curiosity             Love of Learning            Critical Thinking

Ingenuity            Social  Intelligence         Perspective

Bravery              Diligence                        Honesty

Kindness            Loving/Be Loved            Enthusiasm

Citizenship          Fairness                         Leadership

Self-control         Prudence                       Humility

Hope                  Gratitude                        Forgiveness

Spirituality           Playfullness                   Appreciation of Beauty

Take a minute to scan this list and discover which two or three character strengths jump out as most characteristic of you. Then ask yourself, What are some things I do each week to exercise this strength? And an even more powerful query, How do I use this character strength in service to others? For example, you might say that bravery is a character strength and that when you teach your lifeguarding class, you model bravery and encourage bravery in others.

Lost in our consumer culture is the recipe for authentic happiness. That’s nothing new, of course. Socrates said, “He who is not contented with what he has, would not be contented with what he would like to have.” More recently, Henry David Thoreau said, “It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that prevents us from living freely and nobly.” And in a prescient statement about the evanescence of pleasures, Friedrich Nietzsche said, “Possessions are usually diminished by possession.”

To most youth leaders—especially camp professionals—these aphorisms are intuitive. We enjoy living simply, in nature, as much as possible. But few youth leaders know the way out of the materialism maze. Now you do. It’s free and it feels good. (How many things can you say that about?)

Make the commitment to spend some time with the list of character strengths above and do a little soul-searching to answer the question about the precise ways you tap into your particular strengths in service to others. It’s not only a recipe for authentic happiness, but also a path toward global social advancement. And if you enjoy munching on a slice of pizza while you contemplate saving the world, you’ve passed the test.

“What is it?” asked my cabin leader, gently. We both eyed my clay creation as it emerged from the camp kiln, glazed and cooled. I was 12, so I hadn’t made a something; I’d made an anything. It had just been fun to pinch and push the clay for our hour-long arts and crafts period. Now came the hard part: I needed to identify my project.

“Hmm…” I thought out loud.

Finally, my cabin leader said confidently, “Oh, I see. It’s an ashtray.”

And there it was. The year was 1980, so it was still permissible to make an ashtray. Today, the same object would clearly be a politically correct candy dish or a heart-healthy, hypoallergenic soy nut dish. In any case, it was what it was and there it was. Like most arts-and-crafts projects at camp, it was, more than anything else, an expressive snapshot of my thoughts, feelings, and actions at the time of creation. It was simple and personal. Which is probably why it still sits (sans ashes) on my mother’s writing desk.

Volumes are written about what makes art art and what differentiates art from craft, so instead of writing an essay on aesthetics, I just want to share why I think arts and crafts at camp are so meaningful. In my mind, anything creative and pleasing to the senses can be art. Crafts, on the other hand, are construction skills, often learned through apprenticeship. Naturally, arts and crafts go hand-in-hand. Michelangelo used the craft of stone carving to create pieces of art like David. At camp, children learn crafts such as weaving and woodworking to create pieces of art such as baskets and birdhouses. To what end?

Contemporary conceptualizations of the human mind include the idea of multiple intelligences. (Interested readers can find books by Howard Gardner and Robert Sternberg.) Simply put, we have different domains of cognitive strength—such as mathematical, social, verbal, artistic—and those domains compliment each other. So combining some athletic and social activities at camp with some arts-and-crafts actually feeds kids’ brains. It’s kind of like intellectual cross-training. The trouble with some camp arts-and-crafts programs is they are either marginalized or mechanized.

Marginalization occurs when the leadership at camp fails to create an atmosphere where art is valued. Arts-and-crafts becomes an “uncool” program activity and few campers attend the lame periods that are offered. The campers who do participate are labeled in ways that suggest they must not be athletic, adventuresome, or heterosexual.

Mechanization occurs when the leadership at camp relies on kits rather than creativity. Arts-and-crafts devolves into campers purchasing nearly-assembled moccasins, birdhouses, wallets, etc. The activity periods—if you want to call them that—involve very little activity besides counselors explaining to kids how to interpret the kit’s assembly directions. Creative juices dry up along with the seed for self-esteem: a genuine sense of accomplishment.

At the best camps, arts-and-crafts programs flourish because the leadership recognizes the value of a balanced program of activities—something that includes athletics, adventure, and art. Equally important, these programs flourish because campers are challenged to refine their crafty skills, solve problems, and create new works. The brains and souls of these children are nourished and the camp staff become actively involved in their mission: to nurture positive youth development. And as an added bonus, some lucky parents and grandparents may get an ashtray—I mean paperweight—on closing day.

“Will my child be safe at camp?”

Behold the question every parent ponders before and after the camp season. Fortunately, hiring protocols and staff training programs at most high quality camps prevent most people with ulterior or unsavory motives from ever becoming a part of your camp family. Criminal background checks have limitations, but federal law is slowly creating a more reliable system.

The bad news is that every summer, a tiny fraction of the millions of boys and girls who attend camps in North America are either mistreated by a camp staff member during the season or drawn into an inappropriate relationship sometime after. I believe that even a tiny fraction is unacceptable, so I frequently coach parents on the best ways to protect their children. Here is what I share:

(1) I am a tremendous advocate for youth camping. Having worked for decades with dozens of venerable professional camp organizations, I understand what a positive and powerful developmental growth experience camp is for young people. I am also a tremendous advocate of child safety. As a clinical psychologist and waterfront director with two children of my own, I’m probably one of the most safety-conscious people you’ll meet. Indeed, every summer, I bet my staff $1000 that they’ll never catch me in any of our 64 camp boats without a life jacket. I’ve yet to lose that bet. Why? Because most staff at high quality camps follow the rules and lead by example.

Parents owe it to their children to discuss personal safety.

(2) Teach your children about safe and unsafe touch so they understand the difference and could stop and report an inappropriate advance. Even if it happened at camp. I have created a library of video training modules for summer camp staff and youth development professionals, hosted on a website called ExpertOnlineTraining.com. This site provides training to tens of thousands of summer camp staff worldwide, and includes titles such as Safe Touch & Safe Talk, Duty of Care, Active Lifeguarding, and Wise Use of Time Off. The fact is that pre-season online training has become an essential supplement to the on-site training you deliver. Given the choice between highly trained and less highly trained staff, the choice for parents is obvious.

(3) Campers do engage in risky activities at camp, such as swimming, rock climbing, and horseback riding, but wise camp directors ensure that every reasonable precaution is in place to minimize the occurrence of accidents. Those precautions are part of what make risky activities fun, not frightening. Those precautions are also what make parents trust high-quality camps. Naturally, smart parents understand that no camp is accident-free, but when they can see the safety equipment in place, they are reassured. If parents were to walk around your camp while it’s in session—and many do—will they see the lifeguards on duty, see the safety harnesses on the climbers, and see the helmets on the riders?

(4) Sadly, nobody could ever see the potential for inappropriate behavior between a camp staff member and a child. But that invisibility should not stop you from protecting your child from predators by asking the right questions and looking for the warning signs of an unhealthy relationship. Begin by teaching children how to protect themselves from unwelcome or unsafe touch. My Summer Camp Handbook or Norman Friedman’s Inoculating Your Child Against Sexual Abuse both provide detailed guidance.

(5) Search carefully for the right camp. This careful search has many components but the three that most parents neglect are:

a) Finding out whether the camp is accredited and by whom
b) Discussing the director’s education and experience
c) Asking about the camp’s hiring protocols and staff training program.

In these three neglected domains, here’s what I coach parents to verify:

a) The camp you send your child to should be accredited. In the US, this means accredited by the American Camp Association. In Canada, this means accredited by the province in which the camp operates. There are some high-quality non-accredited camps, but you’ll need to personally verify hundreds of health, safety, and personnel standards before resting assured you’ve chosen wisely. Use the ACA’s new Accreditation Standards for Camp Programs and Services as your guide.
b) Your camp’s director should have years of youth development experience under his or her belt and should participate in continuing professional education—such as camp conferences—each year. Find out what their professional credentials are, what conferences or seminars they last attended, and what other camp experience they have.
c) The camp should freely share with you its protocols for conducting required background checks. These could include criminal background checks, but that will only uncover whether a person has been convicted of a felony in the state or province in which the check is conducted. More meaningful is the process of religiously checking a staff member’s references. Finding people who have known the prospective hire well and who have witnessed their work with children is better than verifying whether or not they are not a convicted felon. The camp should also freely share with you its staff training program. Whatever training program a director uses should include modules on appropriate touch, discipline, and communication with children.

(6) Finally, lest a parent’s love and concern for their child evolve into protective paranoia, I emphasize that the personal relationships that form between children and the camp staff are typically wonderful. They are what kids remember most about camp and what they crave during the off-season. These relationships are also the necessary foundation for growth. Without those caring relationships, there can be no increased self-esteem or independence, no growth in social-skills or confidence.

The key to a positive experience at camp is a healthy, nurturing relationship between children and the youth leaders who serve them. For this reason, it is my sincere hope that directors will join me in coaching parents toward safe and healthy camp experiences.

This blog was originally posted on Dr. Caren Baruch-Feldman’s website: http://drbaruchfeldman.com/are-you-ready-to-take-my-happiness-challenge/

It has been really hard to smile this winter with one cold, snowy day after the other. For the first time, I really thought that there may be some benefit to moving to a warmer climate. The weather and cold can really alter our moods and outlooks. I am hopeful that we have reached the tail end of this weather; however, regardless of the weather, there are real ways we can improve our mood and outlook. Here are three easy strategies.

Smile and say, “Hello”: Smiling is contagious. A number of years ago, I had the pleasure of hearing Shawn Achor conduct an experiment with the audience. He asked people to find a partner. He then asked one person to smile genuinely at the other person, while his/her partner was instructed to keep a still face. Guess what happened? Despite that instruction, most people couldn’t do it – they smiled. Why did this happen? Because behavior (both negative and positive) is CONTAGIOUS. The song, “when you are smiling the whole world smiles with you” was right. The underlying, neurological reason for this reaction is that we all have mirror neurons. Mirror neurons mirror back the emotions of others. Therefore, when we are in the presence of smiling people, we feel happy. The converse is also true. When we are surrounded by “Debbie Downers,” we pick up that emotional energy as well. So how can we use mirror neurons to our advantage? We can smile. At school, I smile and say, “hi” to all. I have trained the kids so that when they see me, they smile too and say hello. The exchange of smiles and hellos starts my and the students’ days on the right foot. It’s so easy and costs nothing so if you want to improve your mood, the mood of your family or the larger community, say hello with a big smile.
Focus on the positive: Many of you have heard me do the red experiment, but for those of you who haven’t or for those who need a reminder, here it is… Look around the place you are in right now and try to find all the examples of RED that you can see. Give yourself 20 seconds to look around. Now tell me, what did you see that was GREEN? “Green,” I thought you said, “red.” I did say, “red,” however even though I said “red” you all looked around the room with your eyes, so why couldn’t you tell me what was “green”? The reason is that our focus causes us to note only the object of our focus and everything else fades into the background. So what does this have to do with a positive outlook? If we focus on the negative, (the whining children, the household or work chores, or the stress of everyday life) this negative focus will become prominent in our lives. Without meaning to, it will change our moods and attitudes to the negative. Conversely, if we focus on the smiles, the laughs, and what we are accomplishing, we will feel happier and more fulfilled.
Write it down: Journal the positive and what we are grateful for: We learned from the red experiment that our focus causes us to note only the object of our focus and everything else fades into the background. So if we focus on, but even better, WRITE DOWN what is positive in our lives or what we are grateful for, than this positive outlook will be prominent. Human beings have a tendency to focus on the negative. If your children are playing quietly, nothing compels us to give our kids positive feedback. Be honest, we often see that scene and breathe a sigh of relief. However, if our kids start fighting, we are quick to get involved. That is why we have to make concerted efforts and use active strategies, such as writing things down, to focus our attention on the positive and what is good in our lives. The act of writing is a powerful tool that solidifies our thinking, creates changes in the brain, and makes new muscle memory. So specifically, take a moment and journal the positive; or write down three things you are grateful for; or do what we did with some of our second graders at Harrison Avenue School – write a letter to a person for whom you are grateful. What we found, and what the research supports, is that when we are kind to others and share positive feelings, not only does the other person respond positively, but just as important, our own happiness meter is boosted.
So, I think you are now ready to take my happiness challenge. Here is your challenge.

1) Say hello and smile each day to people you know and yes, to people you don’t know. Even we New Yorkers can do this.

2) Focus on the positive (remember the red experiment).

3) Write down what is positive in your life and what you are grateful for. If you really want the happiness meter to swing all the way, take a moment and write a letter to someone who has touched you in your life and let him/her know how grateful you are. Use the power of writing to your advantage.

All the best,

Dr. Caren Baruch-Feldman, Psychologist

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Please check out my website at drbaruchfeldman.com for additional blogs and articles and follow me at twitter at Caren Feldman@carenfeldman.

Dr. Caren Baruch-Feldman has had success using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help children and adults with depression, anxiety, stress, ADHD and weight loss. She maintains a private practice in Scarsdale and works part-time as a school psychologist in Westchester County, New York. Caren is expert in conducting and interpreting psycho-educational evaluations. For many years Caren was the Camp Psychologist at Camp Ramah in Nyack, NY. Caren has trained hundreds of teachers, administrators, parents and heathcare professionals giving in-service workshops and lectures throughout the country. Caren can be reached at (914) 646-9030 or by using the Contact Form.

This blog was originally posted on Dr. Caren Baruch-Feldman’s website: http://drbaruchfeldman.com/blog-three-strategies-to-help-you-be-the-best-you-can-be/

In my previous blogs, I spoke about making and keeping positive habits, improving self-control, and increasing grit and resilience. For this month’s blog, I will be focusing on three key strategies that I have found incredibly helpful. The three strategies have in common that they 1) cool hot, immediate, and impulsive thinking 2) activate more long-term and thoughtful thinking, and 3) ultimately, allow you to be the person you truly want to be.

1. Make an Advantage Card

I first heard the idea of an “Advantage Card” when I attended Dr. Judith Beck’s Workshop on Cognitive Behavioral Strategies for Weight Loss. She recommended making an Advantage Card to help people lose weight. The idea behind the Advantage Card is to put in writing the advantages for your new, positive habit and to read it each day. An Advantage Card does not only have to be about losing weight. It can be used for any new habit you want to create. I have done Advantage Cards with children that focused on the advantages for calling out less, decreasing procrastination, or being less anxious. The Advantage Card is an effective tool because it places in the forefront what you want to accomplish in the long-term. However, it is not enough to have an Advantage Card. You need to pre-commit to where and when you will look at the card.

Take a minute now and make an Advantage Card for a habit you want to change. Or, encourage your child to make an Advantage Card for what he/she wants to change. You can’t change others so you can’t write an advantage card for another person (e.g., my child will pick up his dirty laundry). Once you have written your card, pick a time and place to read it. Many people choose to read their card first thing in the morning and to leave it on their night stand or in the bathroom. It only takes a minute to read, but it is well worth it.

2. WOOP It Out

Huh? Dr. Gabrielle Oettingen, the originator of WOOP, discusses this principle in her recent book, Rethinking Positive Thinking: Inside the New Science of Motivation. She has done numerous studies and has found that the WOOP technique has helped both children and adults change challenging, negative habits. So how does WOOP work?

W = Wish; O = Outcome; O = Obstacles; P = Plan (if-then)

The idea is that when one tries to increase self-control and/or develop a new habit, one should first imagine what it would feel like to have this wish (w) and outcome (o) occur. But then, just as important, one should imagine what the obstacles (o) are that prevent one’s wish and outcome from occurring. Lastly, one needs to make an if-then plan (p) for this obstacle.

For example, if I wanted to yell less at my children that would be my wish (wish). If I yelled less, I would be happier, my kids would be happier, and I would be a good role model (outcome). However, I don’t do this because the need to be right and getting my frustration off my chest takes over (obstacle). My plan then would be if I find myself yelling then I will remind myself that this is counterproductive and take a step back rather than a step forward (plan).

I used WOOP with a student who wanted to procrastinate less (wish). He imagined that if he procrastinated less, he would be less stressed, happier, and his parents would nag him less (outcome). However, he often procrastinated because he did not want to face the annoyance of the work (obstacle). His plan then was if I find myself procrastinating then I will remind myself of the WHOLE PICTURE and that although I may feel good in the moment, this lifestyle makes me stressed in the long-term (plan).

Dr. Mischel discusses in his book, The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self-Control, that the beauty of an if-then plan is that it gives you time to consider your options and be better able to activate the cool, goal-oriented part of the brain, instead of acting based on what the hot, immediate gratification part of the brain wants.

3. Wait 10

I have a bracelet that says, “Wait 10.” The bracelet (an if-then plan) reminds me to wait 10 minutes before making any decision that my immediate gratification brain thinks is a good idea (e.g., eating carbohydrates after 9 PM). By waiting ten, I have found that I often, although not always, make better choices (drinking tea, instead of eating donuts).

I have made similar bracelets with the kids I work with (e.g., wait 10 before calling out or acting silly). By having a cooling down period, the children have been more successful in tapping into their long-term as opposed to their short-term selves. In addition, to the wait 10 bracelets, I have also made other bracelets with different saying (e.g., “the power of yet,” “breathe,” and “stop and think”) that serve to inspire our best selves.

My point in sharing these strategies with you is not to promote becoming a robot who never engages in fun activities, but rather to inspire adults and children to take charge of their fate, instead of submitting to the short-term, hedonistic part of the brain. Wishing you much success with the strategies 🙂 Caren Baruch-Feldman

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I will be giving a free workshop on this topic (Got Grit? Got Growth? Got Marshmallows? Increasing Self-Control and Resilience in Our Lives and the Lives of Our Children) at the Scarsdale library on Friday, March 6, 2015 from 12:30-1:45. Register with the library by going to http://calendar.scarsdalelibrary.org/event.php?id=894795. If you like these ideas, I encourage you to read Dr. Mischel’s, The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self Control and Dr. Oettingen’s, Rethinking Positive Thinking: Inside the New Science of Motivation. Dr. Oettingen’s has a WOOP app and website (/www.woopmylife.org). In addition, you can get WOOP worksheets at https://characterlab.org/goal-setting.

Please check out my website at drbaruchfeldman.com for additional blogs and articles.

This article was originally published in the January/February 2015 issue of Camp Business magazine.

As a psychologist who works with schools and camps around the world, I am often asked whether competition is good or bad. Proponents of competition speak fondly of their athletic victories and about wanting the same experiences for the young people they serve. Competition, they say, builds character. It’s a competitive world out there, so we had better prepare our children.

Some critics of competition want every child to feel like a winner—always. Or, they want no child to feel like a loser—ever. As the Dodo Bird in Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland remarked, “Everyone has won and all must have prizes!” Other critics don’t want to pit one child or one group against another because they feel it breeds aggression. Still other critics object to external rewards, such as grades or trophies or money, to motivate participation.

There is, in fact, some fascinating research pointing to the dangers of linking a desired behavior to an extrinsic reward. When the reward is removed, the behavior often disappears. It is true that intrinsic motivation is more durable and authentic. Fortunately, not all competition occurs in a radically behaviorist framework, where rewards or punishments shape all behaviors. In fact, research on happiness suggests that a focus on effort, the journey toward achievement, and sharing one’s expertise with others brings more lasting joy than winning a particular competition.

No camp director, teacher, coach, youth leader, or parent wants the type of competition that makes young people unduly anxious, that interferes with their performance and creativity, that treats them like trained puppies, or that makes them inherently uninterested. However, to eliminate competition altogether—as some critics argue—simultaneously eliminates opportunities to learn humility and grace.

Research on the negative aspects of unhealthy competition is mostly solid, but using it as a rationale for eliminating competition altogether may throw the baby out with the bathwater. Although some believe that “healthy competition” is a self-contradictory phrase, here is a different perspective.

An Emphasis On Community

The unhealthy competition I’ve witnessed is ubiquitous, focused exclusively on rewards or punishments that are belligerent, rude, critical, and unfair. A classic example is the child who, after a day at school where grades are the only object, is forced to play in a youth soccer league match where parents emphasize trophies, coaches berate kids, spectators scold the referees, one team has vastly greater talent than the other, and not every child gets to play. Life doesn’t have to be that way.

A healthy alternative to cutthroat competition is cooperative competition. This may also seem like a contradiction in terms, but when competition creates only a little anxiety, demands fair play, emphasizes fun, and adopts a growth mindset, then young people’s performance can be enhanced and they learn to make moral decisions independent of adult caregivers.

Cooperative competition emphasizes the following:

Praising effort, not outcomes. Whereas vapid praise is useless, pointing out specific, incremental accomplishments builds self-esteem. The baseball coach who tells her player, “You stepped into it, swung level, and made contact” is doing a better job than the coach who simply says, “Nice cut,” and is a far better approach than the coach who screams, “Come on! Park that thing! You swing like a baby!”
Focusing on strengths. Instead of comparing a player to his teammates, such as, “Why can’t you kick the ball with the side of your foot like Robbie?” focus on strengths. The coach who tells his player, “You’re passing well. Let’s try that corner kick again” is capitalizing on what’s intrinsically rewarding to a child by focusing on her strengths.
Having fun, but not at the expense of others. The joy of any game should not be in the winning or losing, and certainly not in the harming of others, but in the playing of the game and the cultivation of connections. To that end, cooperative competition emphasizes cheers, not jeers, and handshakes, not prizes. The coach who insists on giving the opposing team a cheer and a handshake, regardless of the outcome, understands cooperative competition.
Engaging children in discussions about their own behavior. Instead of criticizing or praising a particular action, teammates and adult supervisors can ask questions, such as, “Tell me about your decision to pass the ball to Jessie” or “What’s the booing about for you?” or “I see you sitting on the bench texting while your teammates are out there.” Simple questions and process comments prompt sportsmanship and collaboration.
Emphasizing teamwork. Every individual behavior affects others. Pointing that out to children as the behavior is happening builds strong teams and communities. Rather than say, “Stop hogging the ball,” you could say, “Look to see who is open. Work together.” Win or lose, the post-game debrief is another opportunity to emphasize teamwork. To wit: “Our performance was best when players stayed in their zone” or “I liked how the bench encouraged the players on the field” or “We fought hard. What do we need to work on, as a team, during the next practice?”
The cornerstone of cooperative competition is how the adults in charge frame the game or activity. Just about any game can be set up in a friendly or unfriendly way, just as any activity can be explained in a way that promotes anxiety and hurts performance and self-esteem.

Is Winnerless Worthless?

Inadvertently inane—both physically and psychologically—are competitions without any winner at all. Naturally, not every activity should be or can be competitive. When I mow my lawn while listening to 1980s tunes on my noise-cancelling headphones, nobody wins. I enjoy it, especially if it’s a sunny day. Mowing is a decent exercise, and I get a Zen-like pleasure looking at the finished pattern. My stepfather, on the other hand, refers to all yard work as “pure psychic pain.” He’d rather be fly-fishing. According to him, standing thigh-deep in rushing water swinging a hand-tied bundle of bird feathers at a spot where you think there might be a fish is fun. Together we prove that noncompetitive activities have an inherent fun quotient, and that that value varies markedly from one person to the next.

The controversy lies not with our varying experiences of inherently noncompetitive activities, however. It lies more with eliminating competition altogether, or amplifying it to absurd levels. On the latter point, much has been written. Rabid soccer moms and hockey dads be warned. On the former point, let’s pause to assess the outcome and our motives. Sometimes, in a misguided attempt to protect youngsters from a type of moderate competition that is healthy and fun, we dial the knob down so low that we create new dangers.

Consider this example from a games “expert” who suggested an interesting variation on musical chairs. Instead of having the last player standing sit out on each successive round, all of the players will try to sit on fewer and fewer chairs. In that way, no one is ever out, and some would argue there is no risk that anyone would feel like a loser. (Is anyone ever traumatized by being out in musical chairs? Alas.)

I’ve played this game at camp with kids and made several discoveries. First, the game results in more injuries than in regular musical chairs. Trying to get eight or nine kids to sit or somehow balance on a single chair has the potential to be an excellent cooperative game. However, there also tend to be lots of stubbed toes and pinched fingers. Second, there is often more peer criticism than with regular musical chairs. I heard kids say, “You’re too fat to hang on” and “My sister’s more coordinated than you.”

What I learned was that no game or activity is inherently healthy. The wacky version of musical chairs cannot guarantee that some kids won’t feel like losers when the game is over. It is entirely possible that the more-coordinated children will feel good about how they were able to scramble together and balance on the chair, and the less-coordinated ones will feel as if they’ve let the group down, or worse.

Of course, it’s also possible that if someone ran that activity better than I did on my first try, the entire group would have fun and leave feeling good about themselves. That is precisely my point. Skilled teachers, coaches, camp staff, and parents can supervise baseball, musical chairs, or basket-weaving and make it either a constructive or destructive experience for children. There are rules to follow, skills to learn, and strengths to capitalize on. There are friendships to be cultivated, ethical decisions to be made, and successes to be experienced.

Winning With Humility, Losing With Grace

What builds character is not keeping a stiff upper lip when your team loses, or when your painting of a horse looks like that of a cow. What builds character is having others like you for who you are, not how you perform. What builds character is having adults who provide success experiences and set good examples for children. What builds character is being supported in achieving a challenging goal. And what builds character is the self-discipline to persevere—to reattempt—after failure.

One of the best examples of this type of leadership I ever witnessed was, coincidentally, in a game of traditional musical chairs at camp. The first person out was actually one of the cabin leaders. He threw his arms up in the air and shouted, “Now, here’s how you get out in style!” He then boogied out of the circle by combining some break-dancing moves with a beat-boxing he made up on the spot.

You can imagine what followed. Each successive child who was out made up his own hip-hop or song-and-dance routine. There was no arguing, of course, because the campers saw that it was as much fun to get out as it was to stay in. No one felt like a loser, at least not for long. Everyone just laughed and asked to play again.

It’s not whether you win or lose, it’s how adults frame the game.

Dr. Christopher Thurber is a psychologist, author, and father. He serves on the faculty of PhillipsExeterAcademy in Exeter, N.H., and is the director of content for Expert Online Training.

This article was originally published ob Caren Baruch-Feldman’s website: http://drbaruchfeldman.com/part-2-got-grit-got-growth-got-marshmallows-increasing-self-control-and-resilence/

I left you with a cliff hanger. Although I told you the importance of grit and self-control in the previous article, I didn’t go into details as to what strategies you can use. You had to WAIT! But as cookie monster says, “Good things come to those that wait.” This idiom is true for you as well. In Part 2 of this blog, I will discuss strategies parents and teachers can use to increase self-control, grit, and resilience in their children.

Grit and self-control go hand-in-hand. Self-control is about delaying gratification and resisting temptations, while grit is about persevering and remaining on track. Grit is about how to keep saying “yes” (e.g., staying with a difficult task) when yes is needed.

Whereas self-control is often about how to say, “no” (e.g., not eating the marshmallow, not yelling), when no is needed. According to Dr. Duckworth, “grit is passion and perseverance, sticking with your future, day in and day out.”

How do you encourage grit, self-control, and resilience in your children?

1. Don’t swoop in. It is easy as a parent to break into the “mama tiger,” the part of you that wants to protect your children and solve their issues. However, for small matters, resist! Having some challenges to overcome is good for children. For example, as an Elementary School psychologist, I often help youngsters who are experiencing friendship issues. Although I feel for the children (mostly girls) going through it, I know that these experiences will give them strength, thicker skin, and grit later on.

2. We need to be gritty about our kids being gritty. As parents and teachers, we should make it okay for children to face challenges because that is where learning takes place. As teachers, we should create classrooms where trying, struggling, and taking risks are as important, or even more important, as getting the answer correct. Children need to become comfortable with the struggle so they see it as just a normal part of learning.

3. We need to encourage a growth mindset. How do we do that? Help your children to see that when a challenge arises, there is always an opportunity for growth, change, and evolution. Dr. Carol Dweck, in her book, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, describes the difference between a “fixed” and a “growth mindset.” A fixed mindset means that an individual has a set amount, or a fixed amount of talents and abilities. Individuals with a fixed mindset often go through life avoiding challenges and failure. They don’t apply themselves. Why should they? Their talents are fixed. Kids with fixed mindsets can often easily navigate the younger grades, but when they face their first challenge in the later grades, fallapart and quit, rather than persevere. In contrast, individuals with a growth mindset believe that their ability to learn is not fixed, but can change with effort. Failure is not seen as a permanent condition, but rather one from which to grow.

4. Praise the process, not the product. Dr. Dweck speaks about the importance of parents and teachers praising the process as opposed to the product. By doing so, children will be more willing to grow and challenge themselves rather than play it safe. As parents and teachers, we need to move away from “you are so smart” and instead to “you must have worked really hard.”

5. Change the mindset. For all these strategies, one needs to change one’s mindset. Certain mindsets elicit the long-term part of the brain to emerge, and certain mindsets encourage the short-term, immediate gratification part to come out. For example, distracting oneself, not focusing on the hot aspects of the item (looking, smelling, and touching), changing the item to something less desirable, and focusing on the end goal, encourages self-control, grit, and resilience. The point is not to be a robot who never engages in fun activities, but instead to have yourself or your children be in charge of their fate, instead of having the short-term, hedonistic part of the brain take over.

In summary, we need to encourage our children to live their lives as though it were a marathon and not a sprint, to perceive challenges as setbacks to overcome, and failures as learning opportunities. Lastly, we need to lead by example, share our own gritty times, and remind our children that what is often most meaningful comes with work and effort.

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If you like these ideas, I encourage you to read Dr. Mischel’s, The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self Control, and Dr. Dweck’s, Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, Dr. Tough’s, How Children Succeed. In addition, please see Dr. Angela Duckworth’s TED Talk on grit. Dr. Dweck also has an interesting website – http://www.mindsetworks.com (check out brainology). I also wanted to share the following you-tube videos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LmW3H-EXYS0 and Life= Risk–Motivation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yetHqWODp0.

I will be giving a free workshop on this topic (Got Grit, Got Growth, Got Marshmallows? Increasing Self-Control and Resilience in Our Lives and the Lives of Our Children) at the Scarsdale library on Friday, March 6, 2015 from 12:30-1:45. Register with the library by going to http://calendar.scarsdalelibrary.org/event.php?id=894795

Dr. Caren Baruch-Feldman has had success using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to help children and adults with depression, anxiety, stress, ADHD and weight loss. She maintains a private practice in Scarsdale and works part-time as a school psychologist in Westchester County, New York. Caren is expert in conducting and interpreting psycho-educational evaluations. For many years Caren was the Camp Psychologist at Camp Ramah in Nyack, NY. Caren has trained hundreds of teachers, administrators, parents and heathcare professionals giving in-service workshops and lectures throughout the country. Caren can be reached at (914) 646-9030

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