sibling rivalry

[Othersideofthechannel]

What do you do when one child wants to play a particular game with you and doesn't want the sibling to join in?

Bump

DD refuses to let DS join in when we are playing with her dolls house or 'mummies and babies' with soft toys.

I think I chose too dull a thread title!

I would love to know the answer to this question! Or indeed how to get siblings to play anything together without fighting, which always results in one of them in tears/tantrums. I have DD nearly 3 and DS nearly 2 and I seem to spend my days constantly spliting up squables between the kids, who despite having a house full of toys always want to play with the same thing, and never want to share or play 'nicely' together.

So not much help with an answer to the question, but maybe someone will be along soon to tell us how to get our kids to play in harmony. And if it doesn't get better as the kids get older please don't tell me, I don't think I could take it at the moment (we have had a particularly challenging day today!!)

Kittykat, the book 'Sibling Rivalry' by Adele Faber is really worth a read. My DCs usually play quite well together, more than half of the time. I have been rereading it today.

Sharing toys definitely gets easier as they get older. We mostly only have problems after birthdays when the birthday child feels possessive about their new toys.

My problem is that DS rarely plays alone so he always wants to join in on the games DD invents. Whereas she will quite happily get on with her own things while I play with him. So she rarely gets any one on one time. So in that sense I think it is natural for her to not want him to play but I can't find a solution that suits everyone.