Parents sometimes say, “In the real world, effort doesn’t count — only results do.”
And yes, workplaces typically reward outcomes, not the hours or attempts behind them.

But children are not miniature adults, and school is not the workplace.
Learning is a developmental journey — and development depends on effort, struggle, and guided practice.

If we expect workforce-level performance without giving children the space to build workforce-level thinking skills, we set them up for long-term frustration.

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1. Effort Builds the Capabilities Needed for Future Outcomes

Research shows that effortful learning, especially through “desirable difficulties,” leads to deeper, more durable understanding (Bjork & Bjork, 2011). Students learn best when they are challenged just beyond their comfort zone, because they must think, adapt, and reorganise their understanding.

Adults are rewarded for outcomes because they have already developed:

• critical thinking
• metacognitive skills
• persistence
• executive functioning
• independence

Children are still building these capacities.
Effort is how they build them.

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2. When We Reward Only Results, Children Avoid Difficult Tasks

If children believe only results matter, they naturally choose what feels safe: easier homework, familiar question types, memorisation instead of reasoning.

Decades of research by Dweck (2006) shows that praising only achievement fosters a fixed mindset — children become afraid of mistakes because they interpret difficulty as a sign they are “not good enough.” In contrast, children encouraged for effort and strategy use develop a growth mindset and are more willing to tackle harder problems.

In short:
Outcome-only environments create fear.
Effort-focused environments create growth.

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3. Encouraging Effort Doesn’t Mean Praising Everything

Parents sometimes worry that praising effort leads to complacency — it doesn’t.

Effective encouragement focuses on productive effort, not empty praise.

Hattie and Timperley (2007) found that feedback is most powerful when it reinforces:

• strategic thinking
• persistence
• self-monitoring
• trying alternative approaches
• learning from mistakes

This kind of effort is exactly what builds the habits of successful learners and, later, successful workers.

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4. School Is the Training Ground, Not a KPI-Driven Workplace

Vygotsky’s (1978) concept of the Zone of Proximal Development (ZPD) explains why learning requires tasks that are challenging but achievable with support. Children grow the most when they work in this zone — not when they only repeat what they already know.

School provides the scaffolding for this:

• multiple attempts
• opportunities to reflect
• timely feedback
• guided struggle

If children only encounter pre-taught, predictable questions, they never learn to transfer concepts to new contexts — a skill essential for polytechnic, JC, university, and adult life.

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5. Students Who Learn to “Try Hard Things” Become Adults Who Deliver Results

Employers reward performance — but the adults who consistently perform well share common traits:

• resilience under pressure
• ability to break down unfamiliar problems
• adaptability
• independent reasoning
• persistence

Duckworth et al. (2007) found that perseverance and sustained effort (“grit”) strongly predict long-term achievement across academics, military performance, and career success.

These traits do NOT come from being given answers.
They come from repeated experiences of effortful learning.

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So Yes—Jobs Reward Outcomes.

But Childhood Is Where We Build the Person Who Can Produce Those Outcomes.**

Children need space to:

• struggle safely
• make mistakes
• adjust strategies
• verbalise their thinking
• apply concepts in new situations
• keep trying when things feel unfamiliar

This is not “soft” learning.
This is the foundation for future excellence.

As parents, our goal is not to transform children into workers who chase KPIs.

Our goal is to raise thinkers — young people who can reason, adapt, and persist even when the answer isn’t obvious.

Those outcomes begin with effort.

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References

Bjork, E. L., & Bjork, R. A. (2011). Making things hard on yourself, but in a good way: Creating desirable difficulties to enhance learning. Psychology and the Real World: Essays Illustrating Fundamental Contributions to Society, 56–64.

Dweck, C. S. (2006). Mindset: The new psychology of success. Random House.

Duckworth, A. L., Peterson, C., Matthews, M. D., & Kelly, D. R. (2007). Grit: Perseverance and passion for long-term goals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92(6), 1087–1101. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.92.6.1087

Hattie, J., & Timperley, H. (2007). The power of feedback. Review of Educational Research, 77(1), 81–112. https://doi.org/10.3102/003465430298487

Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Harvard University Press.