Stephen Mitchell

There was a child I taught several years ago who, by almost every measure we tend to use in schools, was exceptionally confident.

If there was an assembly to lead, they volunteered before anyone else had the chance. During class discussions, they contributed readily and with enthusiasm, often building thoughtfully on the ideas of others. They relished opportunities to perform, approached visitors with an ease that many adults would envy and seemed entirely unfazed by the prospect of standing in front of a hall full of parents to deliver a speech.

Had you asked any member of staff whether this child was confident, I suspect the answer would have been immediate.

“Absolutely.”

It was therefore something of a surprise when, during a residential visit, we stopped at a small seaside café and the child quietly asked me whether I would order their chips.

At first, I assumed they simply hadn’t seen the menu clearly or perhaps hadn’t heard what was available. I encouraged them to go over to the counter, reassured them that the staff were friendly and suggested they tell the cashier exactly what they wanted.

The child shook their head.

“I can’t.”

There was no obvious reason for their hesitation. They weren’t distressed, they weren’t upset and they certainly weren’t incapable of speaking. They simply found the prospect of ordering food from a stranger unexpectedly overwhelming. Eventually, after a little encouragement, they managed it, but the confidence that had seemed so effortless in school had momentarily disappeared.

The incident stayed with me, not because it was particularly dramatic, but because it challenged something I had perhaps accepted too readily. If confidence was a personal quality that children either possessed or lacked, how could the same child who addressed hundreds of parents without hesitation struggle to ask for a portion of chips?

The more I thought about it, the less surprising it became.

As adults, we move between different versions of ourselves every day. We might feel entirely comfortable contributing to a meeting with close colleagues yet hesitate to introduce ourselves at a networking event. Many people who speak fluently to thirty children every morning would admit to feeling distinctly less composed when making a speech at a family wedding or telephoning somebody they have never met. We do not usually conclude that our confidence has vanished. We understand that confidence changes according to where we are, who we are with and what we believe is at stake.

Children deserve the same understanding.

Yet schools sometimes speak about confidence as though it were a permanent characteristic. We describe children as confident or lacking confidence, often based on what we observe within the relatively narrow context of classroom life. The difficulty is that classrooms reveal only one version of a child. The pupil who appears reluctant to answer a question during mathematics may spend their weekends directing younger siblings in elaborate imaginary games. The child who confidently performs in the school production may become anxious when speaking to an unfamiliar adult. Equally, the child who avoids the stage altogether may negotiate confidently with shopkeepers, sports coaches or neighbours in ways that teachers never have the opportunity to see.

Perhaps confidence is less like a personality trait and more like a relationship between the individual and the environment they find themselves in.

If that is true, then the question changes. Rather than asking whether a child is confident, we begin to ask, “Confident where?” “Confident with whom?” and “Confident doing what?”

Those are more interesting questions because they acknowledge the complexity of communication. Speaking is never simply about producing words. It is shaped by familiarity, perceived risk, social expectations and previous experiences. A child who knows exactly what is expected of them in the classroom may feel entirely uncertain in an unfamiliar café. Another who dislikes speaking during lessons may flourish in a scout group or on a football pitch because the expectations are different and the social risks feel lower.

This way of thinking has changed how I interpret children when they surprise me. I no longer see inconsistency as evidence that I have misunderstood the child. Instead, I see it as a reminder that confidence is not something children carry with them unchanged from one situation to another. Like all of us, they negotiate it continually, responding to the subtle cues each new environment presents.

I still think about that child from time to time, particularly when I hear someone describe another pupil as either “very confident” or “not confident at all”. I wonder whether either description can ever really capture the whole story.

After all, the most confident child I ever taught couldn’t order a portion of chips.

Perhaps confidence was never as straightforward as I had assumed.