We have been working on good sportsmanship with our 5-year-old son these days. He is very competitive and very good at finding ways to win whatever activity in which he chooses to engage (going down the stairs, getting in the car, getting out of the car, getting into the house, getting out of the house, eating, getting dressed, etc.). In the sphere of 5-year-old sporting activities he mostly likes to write his own rules to ensure he wins. If we play catch, he gets points for catching the ball and I lose points when he drops the ball because that means I made a bad throw. I haven't figured out yet how I actually get points. All I know is the score shifts drastically from throw to throw.
"Daddy, you have 15 and I have 1000."
"Okay daddy, now you have 200 because you did pretty good, but I have 10 thousand hundred, so I am still winning."
I have a checkers game on my iPod and he likes to play against himself instead of against the computer, or anyone else who might win. When I tried to explain to him that he should play against someone so he can get better at it he responded mostly by crying and punching himself in the leg emphatically. Later that day, however, he informed me that when he gets to Heaven one thing he wants to do is play checkers with God. He also informed me that he would not be upset if God won.
Well, I guess that is progress of a sort. At least he now concedes there may be someone out there who could best him at something, and he can be gracious when his opponent is omnipotent. Now if I can just convince him to play fairly with mortals we will be all set to tackle the next growth hurdle
Brian
