My charge cannot handle making mistakes

[Anonymous]

My youngest charge is a 7 year old girl. I am with her and her big sister 5 days a week for about 6 hours a day. They are both very bright kids, they do great in school, play instruments, and read way above their grade levels. The older girl (10) is pretty emotionally mature for her age. The 7 year old is also pretty wise beyond her years in some areas, but when it comes to making mistakes, she will literally have meltdowns.

Today she had to practice some piano songs because she has a concert coming up. She sat down and started practicing, and got one note wrong. She threw herself on the ground and screamed, "I have to get it perfect!" I said, "you don't have to do it perfect, sweetie. You're already doing an awesome job." She said, "no I'm not! Everyone else is better than me! I'm so bad at this! It's too hard!" I kept trying to reassure her for as long as I could, but it was clearly in vain. I offered her a hug, and she took it eagerly, and I asked her if she felt stressed about piano, and she said yes and started crying hard. I told her we could take a break for now and come back to it when she feels more calm, and she started throwing her fists around and yelling "No! I have to do it perfect RIGHT NOW! It has to be perfect!"

Obviously, she kept messing up because she was upset and rushing through the song. This is not the first time this has happened, but this was certainly the biggest meltdown she's had over messing up a song on the piano.

She will also have meltdowns or throw tantrums when she messes up on her homework, even though she can easily erase the mistake. If she doesn't get it perfect the first time, she starts crying and saying she's bad at school and she hates homework and she hates herself, etc. One time she literally sobbed in my arms for 30 minutes straight because she colored a square wrong on a homework assignment, even though I helped her put some paper over it and color it back in correctly. Even after it was fixed and looked perfectly fine, she was inconsolable.

I'm always super sympathetic because I was pretty much the same way as a kid. I always used to beat myself up over making mistakes, and I absolutely remember that awful feeling of not doing something perfectly and feeling like a total failure. But it's getting to the point where it's interfering with her work and, honestly, as heartless as it sounds, it's also getting really irritating because I'll be trying to help both kids with homework and other tasks and she will make a tiny, completely fixable error and have an utter freak-out. I never get angry or irritated with her, I always reassure her that she's doing great, she is smart and I still love her even when she makes mistakes, and I make mistakes too, etc. But she doesn't seem to retain any of this.

Anyway, the point of this post is, do you guys have any tips on how to let a 7 year old know that mistakes are ok? Her sister and I make a conscious effort to model better ways to react to mistakes (like just saying "whoops!" lightheartedly and fixing the mistake and moving on.) Beyond that and telling her again and again that she's doing great and making mistakes is normal, I don't know what to do. Her self-esteem seems great in pretty much every other area, and her parents are not perfectionists - they just expect her to try her best, which she does.

I don't know where this is coming from and it's heartbreaking to watch it happen to such a young kid! Help me out, nannies and parents.

[Anonymous]

I would model making mistakes and handling the dsiappointment calmly. "Oops, I just poured the wrong type of pasta into the boiling water. It was supposed to be ziti but this is spaghetti. Oh well, guess we're having spaghetti tonight. I'm sure even though people will be surprised, nobody will be upset!"

"Oh my gosh Maddie, look what I just noticed! I made a mistake folding my laundry and now I'm wearing one white sock and one yellow sock. That's so silly of me!"

[Anonymous]

Have you spoken to the parents about this?

Personally, I wouldn't allow her to practice if she's having a melt down. If she's yelling and throwing fists around, she shouldn't be allowed to practice until she is calm.

Is she generally a serious kid? May be she needs a little more general silliness. Silly games, funny dances, etc. outside of piano to help her loosen up a bit.

[Anonymous]

If she is seven she is old enough to talk through it rationally. This is just anxiety behavior and you should talk her through why she thinks it's so terrible that she messed up.

Let her calm down and then lead her step by step to a rational outcome. Ex:

Why are you upset? Do you think it's bad that you messed up? Why do you think it's bad? What is the worst thing that can happen? When she gives her worst case scenario, let's say that it is "she will never learn that song". Then just continue. "Ok, what if you don't ever learn that song? Then what happens?" She will realize, eventually, that it is not a big deal.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If she is seven she is old enough to talk through it rationally. This is just anxiety behavior and you should talk her through why she thinks it's so terrible that she messed up.

Let her calm down and then lead her step by step to a rational outcome. Ex:

Why are you upset? Do you think it's bad that you messed up? Why do you think it's bad? What is the worst thing that can happen? When she gives her worst case scenario, let's say that it is "she will never learn that song". Then just continue. "Ok, what if you don't ever learn that song? Then what happens?" She will realize, eventually, that it is not a big deal.

I have tried this with her and she usually gives me unrealistic answers. When this big meltdown happened, I let her calm down and then I asked her some questions pretty much like what you outlined. Her answers were all totally dramatic and unrealistic, even though she had calmed down from the meltdown. For example, I asked her, "why do you think it's bad if you don't play it perfectly?" her response was "because if I don't do it perfect EVERYBODY WILL HATE ME!"

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Have you spoken to the parents about this?

Personally, I wouldn't allow her to practice if she's having a melt down. If she's yelling and throwing fists around, she shouldn't be allowed to practice until she is calm.

Is she generally a serious kid? May be she needs a little more general silliness. Silly games, funny dances, etc. outside of piano to help her loosen up a bit.

She is actually a pretty silly kid in general. She can sometimes take things a little too seriously - for example, her older sister likes to make jokes about how cavemen did things, like, "they probably rode dinosaurs instead of cars" and "back then, you could pay for a mansion with a rock." The sister also sometimes does silly accents, but nothing obnoxious or over the top. When her sister draws jokes out for too long the younger one starts getting unsettled and whining, "stop that! I don't like it when you make jokes!" I don't really understand it. But when I make jokes or do silly things with her she laughs her head off and doesn't get upset.

[Anonymous]

Have you tried to do best, worst and most likely? I know that you have asked her about the worst case, but I find it is helpful to ask all three questions- that way they can see how silly there biggest fears are and think though what is most likely going to happen better than just doing the worst case.