Reply to Competitive academics - what to tell the smart, hard-working kid who isn't "the best"

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Reply to "Competitive academics - what to tell the smart, hard-working kid who isn't "the best""

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[quote=Anonymous]My approach is to have my teens take ownership for the time and effort they're putting into activities.  I'll lay it out pretty bluntly that they have two paths.  They can spend 3 or more hours per day or whatever working hard to win whatever competition, or they can spend a much smaller amount of time and accept that they'll likely lose to someone else who did put in the time and effort.  The follow ups are do they love the activity enough that they want to put in that much time, and is the award that big of a deal?  I make sure they understand that either path is fine, and I support any of their choices.  It's okay if they don't win, but they don't get to complain to me about not winning if they chose the lower effort path.

Also, OP, your kids' school has a horrible way of recognizing academic merit.  My kids' school gives the GPA awards and one 'student of the year' type award for every subject, but they make sure that the same kid can't get more than one award.  Also, the awards are based on class achievement plus positive contributions in class, effort, passion, and so on.  There's no reason to let one or two kids get showered with all of the awards.  
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