Siblings - helping your children appreciate the gift of one another

By Lindsday Dunckel, First 5 Nevada County

Printed in the Family Post: Winter Issue 2007

I always say that the person who can make me laugh the most, and make me angry the fastest, is my brother. It’s true of most siblings. My brother and I are eighteen months apart and shared our childhoods in close quarters through many moves. We know each other deeply (including the location of all of the buttons that we can push to get a big reaction out of one another), have the same frames of reference, and share a strong bond. He’s one of my best friends, but last spring, when my mother was seriously ill, I realized that he is so much more than that.

Sibling relationships are the longest lasting of our lives—and that alone gives them a special importance. The flip side of that is siblings fight as children; it’s a given. And telling them that their relationship is precious won’t really sink in. So how can you help your children begin to appreciate one another?

Here’s what studies tell us about sibling relationship: Siblings are often each other’s first playmates and companions, and they learn a lot from each other, especially about social skills and relationships (things like negotiation, conflict resolution, sharing, helping, and cooperating). Most siblings tend to fight: in fact one third of parents report that the relationship between their children “shifts between truce and war”—so if your kids fight, you’re not alone! BUT a moderate amount of sibling conflict actually helps kids: when children basically like their siblings and sometimes fight with them, they are more socially competent and have more emotional control than other kids. Probably children use their siblings to “practice” their social skills, including negotiation, and this helps them create effective peer relationships. In what I thought was a great parenting brainstorm a couple of months ago, I explained this to my eight- and ten-year old, saying that when they fought, they were helping each other’s development. They stopped fighting for the moment, interested in what on earth their mother was saying now. But it quickly backfired on me: when I became exasperated with their squabbling a few days later, my daughter grinned at me and said, “I’m just making him smarter.”

The more similar siblings are, the more they tend to fight (same sex, close in age, similar interests, similar temperaments or personalities). As a parent, you can help by encouraging their differences (without comparing them). Emphasize their individuality, the things that make them unique. Your children compete for your time, attention, love, and approval. Time and attention are limited resources, but there is plenty of love and approval to go around. Make sure your children know that you love them, approve of them, and value them because of who they are.

With baby siblings, make sure the older one knows that the time and attention you have to give the baby were given equally at the same age to your older child. Looking at photos and videos and telling stories can help bring this message home. You can also try to ask the baby to wait at times while you attend to the older one (“Just a minute, George, I know you’re tired of being in the swing, but I need to help Hanna hang up this beautiful picture she drew! I’ll get you as soon as I’ve finished helping her”)—it won’t mean much to the baby, but it will mean the world to the older sibling.

Studies show that children can recognize that siblings have needs that might require different treatment, not equal treatment, by parents, and they are okay with this. So if Johnny has homework to do and needs adult help, a younger sibling generally will recognize this attention as fair. When one child is given preferred treatment, however, sibling rivalry and sibling fighting become more intense.

What can you do to keep your kids from fighting? Here are some things to think about. First, children fight more when parents fight: be aware of what you are modeling. Second, look at how you discipline and control your children: in families where parents use coercive discipline (like hitting, bribing, and spanking) and low levels of parental monitoring of children (not knowing where the children are or what games are being played), there tends to be more fighting among siblings. Kids in these families also tend to be more aggressive with their peers.

What do you do when they do fight? Try not to interfere immediately, unless there is physical fighting involved (you should have a zero-tolerance policy for hitting and hurting). See if they can work it out without you. Sometimes bickering is something to do when you are bored; sometimes bickering is a way to get Dad or Mom’s attention—and you reinforce that when you step right in. When you do need to intervene, keep in mind that you can’t figure out who started it. Don’t even try. Hold both children responsible for any conflict between them because, as we say in my house, it takes two to argue. The younger one may have hit the older one, but the older one may have been quietly pushing the younger one’s buttons to get him to that point—and you won’t have seen that. If you are in a phase with lots of arguing, you can create a new rule: if you fight, you have to be apart. A few times of sending your kids to their rooms the minute they start to fight, calmly and with no discussion, will lead to a quick reduction in the amount of fighting. Believe it or not, siblings mostly like to be together so if bickering leads to immediate separation and no real attention from you, it isn’t worth it.

When they fight over a toy, you can take it from them gently and then say, “I’m going to put it here while you two figure out how you are going to work it out. Let me know when you have a plan and I will get it down for you.” Children play to our expectations. If you act as if you fully expect them to be able to work out their differences, it is more likely that they will. “Hmm, two kids and only one pogo stick. That’s a tough problem, but I know your two can figure out a fair way to work it out.” A friend of mine once reported a fight-busting trick she’d heard about and tried: ask the kids to sit on the couch together and tell them they can get up whenever they give one another permission to do so. They have to cooperate to get up! I tried it with my two when they were 4 and 6, and though they started out angry, they ended up laughing.

A good general rule with helping siblings get along is to try not to get in the way of your children’s relationship with one another: teach them to communicate with each other, to learn each other’s cues, and not to put you in a position to mediate their relationship. Give them the language they need to do this when they are small: “Tell him, ‘I don’t like it when you take my toy!’” Teach them how to read mood and time things right: “I don’t think it’s a good time to tickle your sister—not when she’s feeling mad because it’s raining when she wants to go outside.” Don’t protect one from the other: this is another way of getting in the way of the relationship, and of reinforcing constricting roles for each of your children. If one is the ‘bully’ and one the ‘victim,’ they will play to those expectations, too.

Don’t force your kids to share. Give them the opportunity to do so (Sherry would like a turn with that when you are done) and you’ll be surprised at how often they finish up and give the other one a turn. Ask them what they think would be a fair way to share something, and then put the plan into action. A kitchen timer can help, too, if they want a good, long time with something. You should also have some things that they do not have to share, and a special place to keep those things. Older siblings can start out with a place the baby cannot reach, but you need to begin to reinforce with the baby that those things are not to touch because one day he will be able to reach them. Teach children that they are in charge of keeping their special things in the special place. Don’t worry if the older sibling has lots of things he doesn’t want to share and the younger sibling is willing to share almost everything: this tends to be the nature of birth order and it’s okay just to respect their different wishes.

Along the same lines, it’s good to give your children some time apart. One-on-one time with a parent can go a long way in quelling sibling fighting. So divide and conquer, as my husband and I say, by taking kids off alone to do something with you (even the grocery shopping!).

Another positive way to reduce the fighting is to make a point of encouraging cooperation rather than competition between siblings: not ‘who can get ready fastest?’ but ‘can you both be ready before the timer dings?’ This way, they will help each other and work as a team. They’ll see each other as an ally rather than the competition.

Another way to build good will among siblings is to find things your children enjoy doing together and set it up so that that happens often: they will experience their relationship as positive and have that to fall back on when they are angry with one another. Reflect back to them how much they enjoy each other at times. I still tell the story about how my daughter was the first person to make her brother laugh—both kids love to hear it. I think it reinforces their sense of mutual history, their bond, and their basic enjoyment of one another.

Teach your children how to negotiate, compromise, and communicate with one another. You can start as soon as they are old enough to interact. These skills will last a lifetime and serve them well in many contexts. And when you’re ready to tear your hair our, remember that fighting can help their development—just don’t tell them.

Lindsay Dunckel, Ph.D. and Grass Valley mother of two, is the Program Coordinator for Parent Support and Education for First 5 Nevada County.