Controlled failure

The Child Genius programme conversation came up at home today prompted by a conversation I had yesterday with Victoria.

Ethan piped up that he’d like to watch it but he couldn’t.  So I explained to my child genius (I’m being ironic in case you hadn’t spotted it) that he could watch it on 4OD.

So we sat down and watched the first episode of the 2014 series as a family.

We watched a father who had a strict regime for his son that involved physical exercise, homework, domestic chores and managed recreation.

The next thing we saw was this child being entered into a badminton competition having little or no experience of playing badminton.  His father explained this as controlled failure.  The idea was to expose the child to failure to make success something more desirable, but to do this in a safe and controlled environment.

I said, jokingly, that I did this to Hannah and Ethan, and Ethan piped up that that must be what I’m doing by involving him in the football team that he plays for.