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How can I teach my daughter games can be fun even if she loses?

She's just 4 and she usually quits a game if it looks like she is losing a few minutes after she starts playing...even if I tell her she still has a chance of winning...and she often gets really upset if she plays the whole game and then loses. I wonder if it is just a phase...

3 Answers

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  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago
    Favourite answer

    I think there are some games out there that don't really have a winner or loser, you might look into that.

    I taught my grown-up friend that it's OK not to win all the time. Even adults get frustrated with losing sometimes. We played scrabble and started looking at each other's tiles and helping to make the best words we could. We focused on having a good time and not winning. It's your game, change the rules, ask her to make a funny consequence to landing on a certain square, add something to make it easier, like the "free parking" money in monopoly- it's not part of the rules, it's just something that makes it more interesting.

    Hope this helps.

  • 1 decade ago

    My 4 year old gets frustrated if she is losing but we just tell her it's ok and that with every game someone has to lose. She understand it and even though she doesn't like to lose she is ok with the idea of it now. Today her and my brother were playing Wii. He's 36 and she was beating him and she told him "it's ok to lose sometimes". LOL.

  • Anonymous
    1 decade ago

    Definitely a four year old thing. We almost always let my niece win when she was four because she'd get so upset if she didn't. Now that she's six she understands that she won't always win and that both the winner and loser should be gracious about it.

    Try focusing on activities that don't have a winner and loser, like crafts, dress-up, reading, etc.

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