I help out with my friends' kids pretty regularly - two boys, 6.5 and 3 years old. Most of the time one or both of their parents are around as well, but I'll take the 6.5 year old out for an afternoon or have him for a day in the holidays, and I get on fine with that. Sometimes I'll take the 3 year old to the park, or it's just him at home and playing or crafting or whatever with just him is also all good. But I do struggle to manage both of them by myself when that arises - for example if I'm helping their mum out and she's cooking dinner downstairs, and I'm supervising them both playing together upstairs. It always seems to end in tears every 10-15 minutes.
Obviously conflict is to be expected - they're both learning about how to manage socially, and give-and-take. But does anyone have any tips? Sometimes they play together nicely for a bit, but the 6 year old comes up with complicated rules for games which the 3 year old doesn't follow, or just spends the whole time bossing his brother around, and then there's shouting and screaming and "you can't play with XYZ anymore you're doing it wrong". I try to explain that the younger one doesn't understand complicated instructions, he won't want to play if you just boss him around, how would you feel if someone said you were playing wrong, and so on, but the older one is very literal and wants his own way - not doing what he says is not doing it right. I guess it's a case of repeat repeat repeat?
Also the 3 year old who has zero self of self-preservation will just careen around and hurt himself when they're playing physical games, despite trying to make the environment safe he just runs into doorframes or trips over or whatever and boom there's tears again. They hype each other up and many games seem to involve running around crashing into each other and wrestling on the floor. I don't want to spout cliches but it seems a very 'boyish' sibling relationship!
Does it get any easier? Watching them I'm always on edge waiting for the next bout of shouting and tears!