(this is written by my wife, henceforth known as “Footywife”! )

Sharing is a difficult thing to teach.

We try to encourage our little son to share by letting him experience the “negative effect” of not sharing.  For example if at church he refuses to share his toys with another kid and the kid went away after a while, we’ll point out to him that if he doesn’t share, he has no friends.  If he sees a kid with a toy which he likes, we’ll ask him to share his toys with the kid so that the kid may share the toy with him.

It all went well.  Our little son started sharing some of his toys some of the time.

Last weekend we went to church and brought along some coloring materials.  Now, coloring is not a favorite activity for our little son. So when we took out the materials it was met with lukewarm response.

Our little son then saw a few kids having fun together and wanted to join them.  Before we knew it, he took the coloring materials, ran over to the kids, held out his hands and “offer” it to them.  The kids received the coloring materials with excitement.  They stopped whatever they were doing and started coloring together (with my son).  And thus my little son was “accepted” into the group.

As we look upon him, we can’t help but wonder if we have in our quest to teach him about sharing, unknowingly taught him that material things can be used to “buy” friends?

Yesterday we were at the playground.  A boy was playing with a small car.  My little son wanted to play with it (he adores anything that resembles cars, however remotely!).  He pulled me aside and said, “Mama let’s give him sweets ok?  Then we take the car and play” !!!

Indeed, sharing is difficult to teach.

(this is written by my wife)

(1) The other day my little son and I were at the playground.  He befriended a boy of about 5 years of age and started playing ball with him.  However the ball did not belong to either of them but to a third boy who was generous enough to share.
The 5-year old boy (whom my son was playing ball with) had a bicycle which he parked by the side.  The boy who shared the ball saw it and wanted to ride.  The 5-year old boy immediately swung into action, ran to his bike and positioned his butt on it.  He wouldn’t move his butt and proceeded to play ball with my son while riding the bike.  That kind of slowed the momentum of the ball game and after a while the game died a natural death.

(2) We then went on to another playground and met a 4+ year old boy.  When he saw my son, he said “You didn’t let me play with the black bicycle the other time so I will not let you play with my pokemon toy”.

“Oh!”  I thought, somewhat surprised by the unprovoked comment.  But I know what he said is true because (a) my son’s bike is black and (b) whenever we bring the bike down my son will get me to sit on it when he is unable to man it to prevent other children from riding it.

However, almost in the same breath, he said “Never mind, I let you play”.

It was indeed a day about sharing.

It is so common for children in the 2-3yrs old age band to be selfish, territorial and uncooperative.

Asking them to share their toys will usually draw "undesirable" reactions ranging from sulking faces to absolute defiance.

But parents can take comfort in that only about half of 3 year olds CAN share, and even so, they tend to do it only briefly. You see, learning to share is a totally new concept to a growing toddler.

Maureen Hickey in her article "How To Encourage Children To Become Sharing People " suggested that children need to learn the concept of ownership before they could understand the concept of sharing. And pre-schoolers are not mentally developed yet to fully grasp the idea of sharing.

So don’t feel compelled to push your child to share if you next see him hoarding his toys. He or she may not be ready yet, and it is something beyond his control.

In the meantime, you may want to begin introducing them to this Veggie Tales story that centres on Sharing.