Some students are afraid to compete because they fear defeat. Perhaps they have had a bad experience earlier in their lives in Academic Games or in another situation. Some students adopt the attitude that “if I don’t try hard, I’ll have an excuse when I lose.” They can then say, “Well, I lost but I didn’t take it seriously. I would have won if I had set my mind to it.” Address these attitudes explicitly because they can diminish students’ performance in the classroom as well as in an extracurricular.
Teach students that anything worth doing is worth doing right. Losing is nothing to be ashamed of if you do your best. You develop as a person by competing hard at everything you do even if it means enduring the pain of defeat occasionally.