"Ay'm vewwwy good at that." Self-confidence v. over-praise - location of the shadow line?

[corygal]

Neice aged 8, praise junkie since 18m, now can't hold a conversation without announcing her excellence in all things academic, skills, sport, craft, cycling, you get the idea.

The complacent statement above qualifies anything, derails any talk about anything else and is getting wincingly unattractive. She is capable and not exceptional, as it happens. And popular with friends, so at least it's not a peer problem.

So do you tackle the fact it isn't true? Please God it's a phase in her arsenal of attention-seeking devices, which I am hoping will disappear by magic. But she's 8, not 3, time is coming sooner when she is going to get a shock if it isn't dealt with kindly.

Sounds like she really winds you up. She is just 8! And yes, I'm sure it might get tedious sometimes, but isn't it good that she's trying and succeeding rather than lazily slugging in front if the TV???

Is she really confident in her abilities or does she just want recognition because she's feeling insecure?

When my dd went through the same phase I used to say 'yes you are but it's not polite to mention it too often in case other people get upset that they aren't as good as you.' I frequently followed up with 'don't forget that there are things other people are better at than you too'.
She will realise she isn't the best at everything soon enough, so I wouldn't try to tell her it's not true, just remind her of social niceties.

When she says she's good at something, how about you ask her if she enjoys it? Try and get the focus back on her experience of the thing rather than her attainment? Maybe help her see that being "good" at something isn't the sole measure of value?

She's looking for reassurance. My middle daughter (almost 5) says similar things, such as 'I'm a cleverclogs' if I praise her. I use a mixture of 'DD2, people really don't like it when people show off' and 'yes, you do find x easy, but some people find it hard'.

I've always been quite acutely aware of it, because DD1 has SN, and finds most things a good deal more difficult, and often can't do them, which DD2 finds difficult, because DD1 will say 'I did it!' when DD2 can see that she didn't!