links for 2009-08-13

  • It was Monday when we arrived at Peloso’s small back street shop. He had no stock bikes. All were made to order. “Yes I can make you a bike. When do you want to pick it up?” he asked. “We would like to leave on Friday” I replied. “Impossible, I have to build the frame, have it chromed and painted and then assembled by Friday! Impossible.” Then I mentioned that Baron Smith had sent us. “Well let me see what I can do” was the response…

links for 2009-08-05

  • Echoes something I read in Dan Coyle's "The Talent Code" – they probablly quote the same study – praising children for their effort had a positive effect, whereas praising for intelligence (an innate quality) had a negative effect. FTA:
    The children were randomly assigned to two groups, both of which took an age-appropriate version of the IQ test. After taking the test, one group was praised for their intelligence – “You must be smart at this,” the researcher said – while the other group was praised for their effort and told they “must have worked really hard.” […] The final round of intelligence tests was the same difficulty level as the initial test. The students who had been praised for their effort raised their score, on average, by 30 percent. This result was even more impressive when compared to the students who had been praised for their intelligence: their scores on the final test dropped by nearly 20 percent.