Your child has failed. What do you do next?

They think that failure is part of life and that it is a lesson that children need to learn. But this is not the case. There are methods that really help children learn from failure. Here’s what to do when your child fails!

When a child fails, think of two goals. The first is comfort. Parents need to tell their child how much they care and that they can rely on them. This is pretty obvious, but most parents stop here. There is also a second goal: to help the child build for future success by developing persistence.

Persistence is what stimulates actions such as completing a task, overcoming frustration, investing time and effort, finding creative approaches to difficult problems.

The ability not to give up at an early age is correlated with favorable results later in life, including a higher probability of having good results at school, but also better careers and personal relationships.

There are three strategies that help you encourage your child’s persistence. The first is modeling how persistence looks. Children are sensitive to how their parents or caregivers behave. And the right modeling doesn’t happen overnight. Parents who obviously struggle with something, but do not give up, can naturally encourage the development of persistence in the child. Especially if he repeats this behavior. One way to do this at home would be for parents to do a slightly difficult task, enough to ask for extra help.

Parents can say out loud what they were trying to do and talk about a new approach to the situation – ” It didn’t work that way. I’ll try again. ”

When you see your child doing this and making an effort for a task, praise him. But do not do this only in the case of situations similar to competitions, for which the child sacrifices play or socializing with friends. Praise even the smallest effort. Some parents wonder if they should intervene, interrupt, or praise something the child is already doing. But this will also increase the child’s efforts, which can be extended to other activities and situations that he will encounter in the future.

In general, when you see that he is trying harder or harder than he usually does, praise the little one for what he is doing.

If you do not see this and your child is not doing anything difficult, you need to act. You can stimulate persistence through various opportunities. Take a puzzle, try a new game or toy, or do something that takes time and effort. Then set simple and possibly more complicated goals. Depending on how things are going, the child will have to do more and more tasks while you keep him company. However, the chosen activity should be fun or at least away from harsh reprimands or corrections. The little one should enjoy this experience.

Some people are more persistent than others naturally.

Without training, some people are excellent, others less so. Most of them? Probably somewhere in the middle. But where we start is not the same place we end up. Practice and persistence can teach the child that the process is sometimes as important as the goal.