Praise for Intelligence Can Undermine Children's Motivation (1998) [pdf]
I can confirm that. When i was child, every teacher said to me and my parents that i am so gifted, so smart. And i thought i am so smart that i don&#x27;t need to spend so much time on school like others. So i missed on school a lot. In high school there were classes on which i was less than 50% throughout the semester. And it was ok, i needed only 2 last weeks to pass all the tests. In last year i did the same, again i needed to do tests because i had low grades and needed to pass whole semester on that tests. But this time there was a teacher of my native language (literature etc) and she told me &quot;I know you will pass the test but you was more than 50% of time absent on my lessons i will not let you take test&quot; and i was shocked. Why? Why she didn&#x27;t let me take the test, i would pass it. And then headmaster of my school told my parents that &quot;lot of kids are coming every day to school, they learn, they do homework for every class, they are hard workers and then there is your son, gifted, smarter than the rest, he only needs 2 last weeks to learn and pass the tests, he is not coming to class, he is not doing homework, how he looks in contrast to other students? What example he is giving to them? That you do not need to work hard, you only need to be gifted and smart and you can go by. There is no justice in this, we can&#x27;t make that kind of example, showing that you do not need to come to school, make homework and still get promoted to next year like all those kids that come every day to school, are hard workers, learn, do homework&quot;. They didn&#x27;t promoted me to next class, i needed to repeat it. That was the most valuable lesson i had in that school.<p>EDIT: What i wrote about lesson was not meant in a good way. As someone said in comments i was punished for being different - that was the lesson.