The link between tearing a book and confidence in one's own movements

Self-confidence in a toddler is not built through grand speeches or abstract encouragement, but through the accumulation of small, concrete successes, experienced and felt directly in their own body. Each mastered gesture, however modest it may seem to an adult, contributes to this gradual development.

The felt book offers a particularly fertile ground for this type of repeated success. Pulling a page, seeing it detach, and then managing to reattach it correctly constitutes a complete sequence, with a beginning, an action, and a clearly perceptible result—exactly the type of experience that effectively nurtures a baby's sense of competence.

What distinguishes this success from mere chance is its reproducibility. The baby does not succeed just once by luck: they can repeat it, over and over, and consistently achieve the same positive result. This regularity transforms a one-time success into a true internalized skill, upon which the baby can rely with certainty.

This certainty acquired through a precise gesture then generalizes, at least in part, to other areas of action. A baby who has learned that they are capable of mastering a difficult gesture on their own, without external help, generally approaches subsequent challenges with a more confident and persistent attitude than if they had never experienced this sense of mastery.

The fact that the gesture carries no real risk of problematic failure also plays an important role. Even if the baby doesn't manage to reattach the page perfectly on the first try, there are no negative consequences: they can simply try again, without pressure or judgment, which encourages them to persevere rather than give up at the first sign of difficulty.

Parents play a valuable role in this process by avoiding intervening too quickly to "help" the baby succeed. Allowing enough time and space for the baby to try, possibly fail, and then succeed on their own reinforces their confidence far more than if an adult were to perform the gesture for them at the first sign of trouble.

It is this patient accumulation of small, autonomous successes, page after page, that makes the felt book a true tool for building self-confidence, going far beyond its initial role as a simple reading object for toddlers.