Episode 170: Punishment
Dr. Chelsea: Welcome to Passion for Dance! I'm your host, Dr. Chelsea, and I'm on a mission to create happier, more successful dancers through positive mental skills. And if you are of a certain age in this dance industry, like me, you probably had to run laps when you were late to practice or would be kicked out of ballet if you crossed your arms in class.
For many of us, we grew up with coaches and directors who used physical punishment for bad behavior and mistakes. It was the norm. It's what many of us were used to. And if you're currently using any type of physical punishment on your team, even in the name of motivation, I want to challenge that practice today based, not only on my time coaching and teaching, but based on science and what psychology tells us about behavior change and motivation. I want to encourage you to try another approach. So I hope you consider these four reasons not to punish with pushups!
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Hi, I'm Dr. Chelsea, a former professional dancer and mental performance coach. I know what it feels like to be a passionate dance teacher who cares about your dancers, but you want to challenge them and help them be their best, and I also recognize that some traditions and teaching practices in the dance world are harmful. So I'm on a mission to change our dance industry by creating happier, more successful dancers using positive mental skills.
When you understand how to help your dancers with their confidence, how to find their own motivation, work together as a team and more, your dancers will unlock new levels of competitive success and happiness. And it's not just about them; you deserve the same. So we'll talk about how dance teachers can use positive mental skills to be more confident, resilient, and motivated as well.
Be sure to hit “subscribe” wherever you listen to podcasts. There are new episodes every Thursday, and each week you'll hear from me and my guests with advice and actionable tips for building mental toughness, covering topics about mindset, motivation, resilience, and building a community. Passion for Dance is a show designed to help dance educators like you have a positive impact on every dancer you teach.
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Why Not to Use Physical Conditioning as a Form of Punishment – 2:05
It's still relatively common to have a team do wall sits when someone forgets their jazz shoes or do pushups if the pom routine looks lazy. I've heard from lots of teachers, “That's how it was for me. It taught me discipline. I know I didn't make that mistake again.” And that's probably true, and I'm not saying to never have punishment. There are real occasions when punishment is necessary, and I'm a big advocate for clear rules, boundaries, and enforcing those rules. But a culture that focuses on punishment when you're trying to learn will create a group of scared and fearful dancers. That's the key. I'm talking about using punishment when you are trying to learn.
It's really hard to be excited for practice or work hard in a ballet class if you're constantly worried about getting in trouble. So in the context of teaching actual dance class and working on technique and choreography, here are four reasons you shouldn't use physical conditioning as a form of punishment.
#1: Punishment Only Works Short Term – 3:02
Number one is that punishment only works in the short term. When you impose a physical punishment, what do you hope will be the outcome? Usually, you want whatever behavior you just saw to never happen again. You want the dancer to be on time or be responsible or work harder in class.
So let me pose a simple question: does running a lap help them be on time in the future? Well, in the short term, yes, it probably works. We know from decades of psychological research that punishment works in the sense that people do learn. Our behavior changes, but only in the short term. For a week or so, your dancer will be on time, but they change their behavior out of fear, and essentially the lesson wears off and the same bad habit that made them late in the first place will start to happen again.
Punishment doesn't help you make long-term change, and it doesn't encourage you to focus on learning. So, yes, you'll likely see an immediate improvement, but what you don't see is the psychological impact. When your dancer is doing wall sits because they forgot a correction from yesterday, what do you think's going through their head when they're in the wall sit? Either they are now scared to make a mistake in the future, which will likely destroy their growth as a dancer, or they're just cursing you in their head, and now they're in a bad mood. I bet they're not reviewing the correction you're hoping they're going over. They're too emotional now to focus on the thing you wanted to emphasize.
I want to add a little caveat here that I have talked to some teams and coaches who have a self-imposed rule where if you make a mistake in choreography, you note it for yourself and do, say, five pushups. It's not my favorite approach, but it depends on the team culture. I have seen it work for very self-aware dancers who are using it as a way to take accountability and show their teammates their own focus. They're essentially saying, “Okay, I know I missed that part.” They get up and review the part they missed after doing a few pushups. The pushups are just about accountability and signaling to the team, “I got it. I'm going to fix this,” but then they're actually working on the thing they missed as well.
To me, I think you could skip the pushups and just review the thing you're taking accountability for. But again, I've seen teams with a strong culture who find the pushups to be a positive way to communicate accountability on the team.
So in general, like I said, not my favorite. I would avoid it. But I wanted to share one way I have seen it work, and the reason it works is because it's not a punishment coming from a coach or a captain. It's a self-imposed accountability tool on a team that already has a strong positive culture. There's a big difference.
#2: Conditioning Just Shouldn’t Be Punishment – 5:40
The second reason is that conditioning just shouldn't be punishment. Dancers are athletes. If you want your dancers to improve their cardio training or work on explosion in their legs for better jumps, then running and wall sits shouldn't be a punishment. Strength training is training for improvement and something all athletes do. If you want your dancers to grow, you want them to push themselves in strength training because they understand it will make them a better dancer. There's a much better chance of that genuine internal drive if they want to get better rather than being forced to do a static hold when they're being punished.
Doing the hard work in training is about learning the self-discipline it takes to persevere when it's hard. If you want that work ethic and that internal drive during strength training, but then the next day you expect them to do the same drills as a punishment for poor behavior, your dancers are going to be confused. You won't see the self-motivated athletes train hard if the same training is also punishment. You don't want the eye-rolling, lazy athletes during cardio training, so separate the physical strength training from punishment.
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#3: Physical Punishment is Typically Not Related to Behavior You Want to Punish – 8:11
Number three is that physical punishment is usually not related to the behavior you're trying to punish. When it's not related to the actual behavior, it likely won't create the outcome you want.
Psychology taught us a long time ago that the approach to a punishment is like the old saying, “Make the punishment fit the crime.” If they're late, have them sit out and write down their weekly schedule in a planner to show you every day for the rest of the week. If sitting out means they got blocked out of a routine, that might be a natural consequence, but running laps doesn't have anything to do with the behavior you wanted to fix, and it doesn't give them any strategies to make sure it doesn't happen again. If they're being lazy in practice, punishing them just brings up negative feelings and emotions, which makes them less likely to work hard, not more.
Instead, you may need to talk about why they're having such a bad day, talk about your goals and expectations again, remind them why it matters and what they really want. And you can do that in a more stern approach. It doesn't have to be like, “Let's all sit and have this warm, fuzzy conversation.” That might be what they need, but you can also have a like, “Let's go. We need to get going. We have goals. Let's get up. Let's make this happen.”
So talking to your dancers about their why, their goals. Hopefully they know why you're doing this conditioning. They know what it's for and why it matters to them. They may need a little reminder, but ultimately they always have a choice. If they want to be in a routine or compete well in a few weeks, they have a choice to make today that will improve their chances. They can find the drive and effort to put in more work, or they can be lazy and not reach the goals they have for themselves. Tie it back to what they want.
The psychological definition of punishment includes the fact that behavior will be reduced. So this is how punishment works. When a behavior is punished, you reduce the likelihood of the behavior happening again. But when you hand out a physical punishment, what behavior is being punished? Because it's not usually related, you're likely sending a mixed message. So let's stick with the late practice example.
What if they were late because they had a fight with their mom, or they stayed after to talk to a math teacher about an upcoming quiz? When you make that dancer run laps, the hope is they won't be late again. And again, it might work in the short term, but really they will likely stop doing the behavior that made them late. And that might be a bad choice. They might learn there's no time to talk to teachers about academics or feel like they can't be honest with their mom because it might blow up, and I don't have time for that.
You likely won't know exactly what lesson they take away from that punishment. You assume they're going to get their act together and not be late, but, likely, that's not actually what they're taking away from that lesson. Bottom line: physical punishment is likely not related to the behavior you're trying to change. So the lesson will also have nothing to do with the behavior you were trying to change in the first place.
Our brains are very good at learning and making connections, but you can't always control what that lesson is or what connection is made unless you actually have a conversation with your athletes. While you may hope they think, “Okay, being late was embarrassing because my whole team had to do pushups, so I will never do that again,” when in fact they are more likely thinking, “I'm so embarrassed. I can't believe I screwed up this bad. Now coach is disappointed and hates me. My whole team is mad at me.” They turn inward, they collapse, and their effort and intensity is going to decline, not get better.
So I ask you to just consider how does that mindset serve you on your team now that practice is about to start? Likely, it's going to bleed into the rest of practice. It becomes very challenging to have this positive team environment I hope you're trying to create.
#4: Physical Punishment Makes Dancers Afraid to Fail – 11:46
And number four, the biggest reason not to use physical punishment is that it makes dancers afraid to fail. Usually, punishment is embarrassing and demeaning in front of the team. So the lesson learned is, “I never want that emotion again.”
Now that may seem good, and you think, “Good, they'll get their act together.” But to be blunt, that's not how it works. Instead, they will likely internalize the mistake, believe they're a bad person, not that their act was bad. They are now a bad person, and they will do anything to avoid that in the future, which means no risks, no challenges, keep things safe.
So a week later, when you want that dancer to work on a new hard skill, she'll play it small. She doesn't want to make a mistake and embarrass herself in front of a teammate. Again, our brains make all sorts of connections every day. Sometimes they're unconscious. So they may take that punishment they received after they forgot to bring their fundraising money and generalize it to mean they can't make a mistake ever. So they dance small, they don't go for it, and in our world as performers, they're likely never going to be their best onstage.
Avoid Using a Demerit System – 12:49
All four of these are reasons not to use a demerit system as well. Especially within school settings, I still see this tradition hanging on. When you use the style of behavior modification, you're tracking infractions, which highlights the problem and makes dancers afraid to make mistakes. And if we're trying to create a team environment of growth and mistakes while learning are okay, that system is going against what you're trying to create.
So, instead, reward. Focus on the good things. Celebrate the dancers who are prepared and working hard. Highlight the behaviors you want to see more of rather than focusing on punishing the behaviors you want to get rid of.
Now, again, all of this isn't to say punishment itself is bad. It has a time and place, and if it's directly related to the desired behavior and comes with a two-way conversation, it can be effective and it has its place. But based on how our brains work, what is not effective is physical punishment when a dancer is trying to learn, especially when that punishment comes with shame and embarrassment. And I've learned over the years, this topic ruffles some feathers, and I'm okay with that. If you completely disagree, okay. If you're now questioning everything, that's okay too.
My goal here is to never tell you exactly how to coach. I'm here to tell you the science and give you the strategies so that you can develop happier and more successful dancers. But they are strategies that are never going to be a one-size-fits-all. So take the info and every strategy I talk about and, frankly, take in what you believe will work for you and your dancers. We're all just out here trying to do what's best and help them love to dance as much as we do and maybe becoming better people with some solid life skills while we're at it.
Thank you for taking your time to listen in today, and thank you for sharing your passion for dance with the world!
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Thank you for listening to Passion for Dance! You can find all episode resources at www.chelseapierotti.com/podcast, and be sure to follow me on Instagram for more high-performance tips at @dr.chelsea.pierotti. This podcast is for passionate dance teachers and coaches who are ready to change the dance industry by creating happier, more successful dancers. I'm Dr. Chelsea and keep sharing your passion for dance with the world.
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