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Very few things are as dangerous as a bunch of incentive-driven individuals trying to play it safe.

Alfie Kohn

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Alfie Kohn
Age: 67
Born: 1957
Born: October 15
Author
Teacher
Writer
Miami Beach
Florida
Risk
Dangerous
Incentive
Individual
Incentives
Play
Individuals
Trying
Bunch
Things
Management
Driven
Safe

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Educational success should be measured by how strong your desire is to keep learning.
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Punishment and reward proceed from basically the same psychological model, one that conceives of motivation as nothing more than the manipulation of behavior.
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Learning is something students do, NOT something done to students.
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Trying to be number one and trying to do a task well are two different things.
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When test scores go up, we should worry, because of how poor a measure they are of what matters, and what you typically sacrifice in a desperate effort to raise scores.
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Don't let anyone tell you that standardized tests are not accurate measures. The truth of the matter is they offer a remarkably precise method for gauging the size of the houses near the school where the test was administered.
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Saying you taught it but the student didn't learn it is like saying you sold it but the customer didn't buy it.
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If faculty would relax their emphasis on grades, this might serve not to lower standards but to encourage an orientation toward learning.
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A preoccupation with achievement is not only different from, but often detrimental to, a focus on learning. Thoughts and emotions while performing an action are more important in determining subsequent engagement than the actual outcome of that action.
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Independence is useful, but caring attitudes and behaviors shrivel up in a culture where each person is responsible only for himself.
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Unconditional parenting: Moving from Rewards and Punishments to Love and Reason.
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Grades dilute the pleasure that a student experiences on successfully completing a task.
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How can we do our best when we are spending our energies trying to make others lose - and fearing that they will make us lose?
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How we feel about our kids isn't as important as how they experience those feelings and how they regard the way we treat them.
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Students should not only be trained to live in a democracy when they grow up they should have the chance to live in one today.
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Grades are a subjective rating masquerading as an objective evaluation.
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You have to give them unconditional love. They need to know that even if they screw up, you love them. You don't want them to grow up and resent you or, even worse, parent the way you parented them.
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People will typically be more enthusiastic where they feel a sense of belonging and see themselves as part of a community than they will in a workplace in which each person is left to his own devices
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Those who know they're valued irrespective of their accomplishments often end up accomplishing quite a lot. It's the experience of being accepted without conditions that helps people develop a healthy confidence in themselves, a belief that it's safe to take risks and try new things.
Alfie Kohn
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Punishments erode relationships and moral growth.
Alfie Kohn