<human>: Our oldest son is 3 and will be 4yrs old early next year. He's a great kid, extremely smart, is very polite and considerate, and has much more empathy for others than I do. There is so much I love about him.

But one thing my wife and I notice and want to help him with is his perfectionism. He easily gets upset when he doesn't get a question right, or isn't the first one to answer, or fails at kicking the soccer ball. I'll give an example: I watched a video of him at his daycare where they were teaching the class the letter A. The teacher asked the class to close their eyes, and removed one of the picture cards that were laid out on the floor (think of a bunch of flash cards with items starting with A: acorn, apple, alligator, etc), and then asked the kids to open their eyes and identify which one was missing. He looked carefully but before he could say it another child answered correctly and received praise from the teacher. My son then visibly got upset and put his hand into a fist and hit his own leg, and basically checked out of what the group was doing for the next 15~30 seconds.

I've seen something similar happen on multiple occasions. We've tried reassuring him when he's wrong or isn't first that it's ok, he can try again next time, etc. I don't believe we are very perfectionist with him although we have high standards for him, but it's possible we are far less forgiving than we think we are. I'm not sure.

Do other parents have young toddlers who are like this? Any advice for how to get him to let up on himself? Thankfully he doesn't get angry at other people in these situations, he just gets angry at himself. But I'd rather him not get angry at all, and be OK with failure.

Condense the text into a few key points
<bot>: 3yr-old son is perfectionist and gets very upset at himself when he's wrong, need advice on how to get him to relax