Some people do not allow their children to participate in games, sports, or competitions unless everyone gets a prize. Others think that children must learn to deal with winning and losing in order to be fully prepared for life. v.2

From the moment of being born until becoming an adolescent, children needs special care and guidance from teachers, parents and friends become a healthy, intelligent, and ethical individual. According to some people, through participating in activities that involves competitive challenges, children can develop and ready themselves for life ahead. However, there are also some opposing views to this claim as well, stating that such action would not be beneficial unless there are prizes for everyone. In this essay, both perspectives will be discussed. Firstly, according to the opinions of some citizens, games, sports or competitions should not be involved with if they do not grant at least some sort of recognition in the form of rewards to all players due to the negative effect of losing may have on their child, and a possibility of the loss of motivation to join future similar activities occurring. In other words, young children, who do not get compensated for their efforts at the end of doing something, may feel insecure about their own abilities and intelligence which will lead to the act of not going out of their comfort zone later on. For instance, in a recent survey carried out by scientists, on the topic of the development of confidence in early childhoods, from the university of Oxford, 86% of parents, who was interviewed, saw a slight to medium decrease in their children's confidence when they do not get rewarded for playing a game or joining sport festivals in their schools. In addition, 57% of the same target group expressed concerns about the loss of the desire to partake in future games or competitions from their offsprings. On the other hand, there are also some opposing arguments to the beliefs above as well. As a matter of fact, winning and losing are a part of life, and it is crucial for parents and teachers make sure the new generation can learn this lesson in order to become a tirelessly productive and hard working individual. Simply put, young contestants, who realize that there will be not anything given to them if they fail the competition, will be given an incentive to try harder and put in more effort into winning, which will result in a vast improvement by the end despite winning or losing. For instance, a report on the development of skills for children in the UK has shown that almost 90% of young generation will likely go to become more actively involved in doing something if they know what they will most likely going to lose (or in this case, not going to have) by the end of a task, which consequentially improve their resilience and work ethic tremendously. In conclusion, ranging from the attempt to protect the self confidence of young individuals to ensuring that hard-workings and goal oriented seeds can be planted within our new human resources, it is undeniable that both sides have reasonable explanations and valid points of argument. From a personal point of view, the latter side of the debate is more appealing due to the real reason being offered, and parents as well as educators should put more attention in creating disciplined rather than self-assured but entitled children.