If At First You Don’t Succeed, Try, Try Again

A toddler abandons a block tower the second it falls. A preschooler declares “I can’t do it!” halfway through a puzzle. Kids often melt down the moment something feels hard. It’s easy to read these moments as signs of temperament or ability. Or for caregivers to think ‘They’re just not persistent. They give up too easily.’

Developmental research actually suggests a calmer interpretation. Perseverance isn’t innate. It’s a skill that develops gradually, shaped by experience, support, and everyday interactions.

What perseverance actually is in early childhood

From a developmental perspective, when children experience effort as supported rather than stressful, they are more likely to stick with challenges over time.

Research shows that even in infancy, children persist longer when they see adults model effort and use language that highlights the process and trying, not just succeeding. This means the ability to persist begins forming well before children can articulate goals or understand praise in abstract terms.

For toddlers, hearing caregivers praising the process of trying (i.e. ‘You worked really hard to finish that puzzle’) instead of just positive praise (i.e., ‘Good job’ or ‘Good girl’) contributes to their later thinking that their skills and intelligence can grow and improve.

Children’s ability to persist is fostered through ordinary everyday moments, not through drills or motivation speeches.

What this looks like by age

Infants (0-1 year)For babies, perseverance is about exploration, not achievement. This can look like reaching for a toy, trying for weeks to roll onto one side, lifting a heavy head on the tummy time mat. When grownups narrate effort in these moments, babies learn that trying is part of how the world works.

Simple observations like “That’s hard, you’re working so hard to lift your head,” help connect effort with safety and support.

Toddlers (2-3 years)Toddlers practice perseverance through repetition and trial-and-error. Struggling to put on their own shoes. Pouring water that spills. Tracing letters with a shaky hand.

Letting toddlers try first, then guiding with calm language, supports persistence without turning struggle into frustration.

Preschoolers (4-5 years)Preschoolers begin forming beliefs about themselves as learners. This is when perseverance starts to sound like: “I can figure this out.”

Grownups can support this by modeling mistakes and adjustments in everyday life. Sharing a small moment of, say, dropping an egg on the ground, cleaning it up, and reaching for a new one shows that effort and revision are normal, not embarrassing. Adults can also be available when they seek help and supportive when children return to a task after a pause.

Where screen time fits

Perseverance doesn’t develop only through hands-on tasks. Stories can model this too.

When children watch characters struggle, feel frustrated, and try again, those narratives can become shared reference points. The developmental value comes from noticing effort rather than outcomes, especially when adults stay engaged.

A brief comment like “That was hard for them” or “They tried a different way” helps reinforce that struggle is part of learning, whether it happens on screen or off.

Maka Imprint: Filtering Shows For Perseverance

When you select the sub-domain ‘perseverence’ in the Maka Kids app, we filter for shows that model and encourage determination and resilience when facing challenges or setbacks. Maka Kids utilizes our proprietary Imprint to evaluate seven core domains of development that a show can support. Within the Imprint, the ability to persist falls under the domain of ‘Character’. Maka believes that children’s ability to persist contributes to their values and overall character development supporting how they approach their relationships and the world around them.

A steadier takeaway

Frustration and stopping are not signs that perseverance is missing. They are often signs that a child is right at the edge of what they can do. Grownups can be a supportive presence for kids and can help model what to do next and how they can handle the frustration that comes with trying.

Perseverance grows when children experience effort as something they can return to, with support. Over time, those experiences add up. Not because children were pushed, but because they were supported through trying.

References

Gunderson, E. A., Gripshover, S. J., Romero, C., Dweck, C. S., Goldin-Meadow, S., & Levine, S. C. (2013). Parent praise to 1-to 3-year-olds predicts children's motivational frameworks 5 years later. Child development, 84(5), 1526-1541.

Leonard, J. A., Duckworth, A. L., Schulz, L. E., & Mackey, A. P. (2021). Leveraging cognitive science to foster children’s persistence. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 25(8), 642-644.

Leonard, J. A., Lee, Y., & Schulz, L. E. (2017). Infants make more attempts to achieve a goal when they see adults persist. Science, 357(6357), 1290-1294.

Lucca, K., Horton, R., & Sommerville, J. A. (2019). Keep trying!: Parental language predicts infants’ persistence. Cognition, 193, 104025.