I'm just reading an interesting German discussion on the English obsession with forcing children to share - apparently this is wrong, wrong, wrong and even to blame for ...

[emkana]

... the recession, as forcing young children to share encourages excessive greed in adulthood.

but seriously, the German consensus is that children should not be forced to share, that they have a right to defend their things and that it's not that children must learn to share, but that children must learn to accept ownership, so as not to demand things that others have. With the argument being that adults are not expected to share their things either, so why should children?

I can kind of see where they are coming from, but for everyday life I would find it very difficult. If ds has a visitor who wants to play with eg his digger, and ds won't let him, and visiting child cries, then I feel I have to enforce that ds shares, because I feel sorry for visiting child and because I want ds to learn empathy. But German viewpoint is that at ds's age you can't expect empathy so shouldn't aim to teach it. So what do you all think?

Well that's the thing isn't it - what is common courtesy or hospitality and what is your right to refuse?

Removing unshareable toys does seem the right kind of compromise.

Though I think Lockets has it too - when things start getting horribly unreasonable, leave.

I would, the minute there was welling-up and the snapping back of the biscuit tin lid

Yup. It'd be put away in your special place Lenin. BUT if I said 'can I turn on your telly?' (whilst scoffing all your biscuits) would you think it reasonable to shout "No. It's MINE. You can't touch it?'

Isn't this limiting the idea of sharing to possession and ownership? I think we use sharing in our society as a springboard to teach our children other qualities that we value - empathy and charity to name a couple.

smugaboo, excellent point. That's exactly the reason why I want my children to share.

I wouldn't tell ds to hand over a toy he's playing with immediately, but I would say something like "5 minutes, then give x a turn" and I would enforce that after the time is up.

does explain why Germans get so het up over sunbeds - because they have established "ownership". Meanwhile sensible Brits would say that you use it while you need it and don't have loads lying about unused. Seems to me the sunbed thing shows greed and lack of consideration for others.

You teach children to be considerate - so don't have friends around unless you want to play with them. Adults play in slightly different ways . I wouldn't give in to a visiting child demanding a toy immediately but would expect my child to let them have a play with it once they had asked nicely.

I try to teach 'talking' and 'negotiating' rather than 'sharing' as the core concept.

It makes sense for me - albeit it does lead to rather protracted bartering with my two year old.

Thinking about it we've tended to do a bit of both and I'm wondering now that has been influenced by DP being part-German?

For example if DS had a friend (X) to visit and X wanted to play with DS's favourite digger we would have said "Yes its your digger DS, X just wants to play with it while hes here. It will still be here when X has gone and it will still be your digger"

Thats always seemed to work well as ownership is made quite clear therefore no threat is posed

"You can share my chocolate but keep your hands off my dp"

Now you see Janeite - I would say the exact opposite ...

"5 minutes, then give x a turn" don't see how this approach can be damaging tbh!

we had to share everything growing up. even a packet of angel delight was divided up between five of us! I did used to dream about having a bowl of angel delight ALL to myself, but I've never actually gone out and done that now I'm an adult!!

I agree about the sun bed/towel thing, I was shocked on a holiday to see that that's not a cliche. They do do it. It shows a brass neck! (imo)

Is Angels Delight supposed to be a single serving . We used to use half a packet between me and my sis and save the other half for another day.

oh you were lucky. I bet you had a soda stream too.

We did. We has loads of flavours because dad (indulgent) was in charge of 'drinks'. Actual food came under our mothers jurisdiction (mean) so their was a lot a halves of things.

my mom used to go down to the pool and take the towel off whatever lounger she wanted and drape it across a railing or wall close by, then when they came down with a pissy look on their face she'd say quite loudly 'is that your towel by any chance, you left it behind by accident so i left it over there for you in case anyone stole it' with an innocent look on her face.

they always backed down

my mother is the irish one... i was the one who suggested i climb over the fence to the pool at 2am and drape our towels on longers then so we'd get in ahead of everyone but she wouldn't hear of it

oodles... my mother used to give me a single rol or chocolate button as a treat... even up to 9/10 years of age.

she could make a packet of rolos last 2 weeks

i think a debate about sharing needs some talk of
'snatching' which is a bad thing worthy only of swiper
and also 'wanting something ONLY because the other child has it' which seems to be innate but also a bit silly

I'm sort of inbetween. I think the child who's toy it is should generally have priority and think other (usually younger) children have to learn that some stuff belongs to their sib and they can only use it with their permission. No-one insists adults share their personal stuff and favourite gadgets.
On the other hand I think learning about empathy and being nice to people and sharing is an essential part of becoming a pleasant civilised person.
If my kids had friends round when young they were always told they had to share their toys, otherwise the child wouldn't want to come again. I think very young children (under 4 or 5) don't play together much really anyway. They tend to play separately but alongside each other, particularly boys. Sharing doesn't really work here. I would never invite a child to our house though and expect them just to watch my kids play with toys. That's just cruel.
Snatching is horrible. If my kids snatched they immediately got snatched object removed from them. Children tend not to want to play with snatchers given the choice.
As they get older they enjoy showing off and sharing their toys, well my kids do anyway.
I've found sorting out sibling sharing boundaries trickier than friends. The oldest sib is the one usually needing protection from the younger one as older kids aren't usually interested in little kid toys.

Agree that forcing a child to share is not going to achieve much. I do think that getting the child on board with regard to sharing in a general sense is a life skill we do have to teach them though.

My approach is to ask my 3-yr-old what she and her friend would like to play with, before the friend arrives. She'll choose the dolls' house or the play-doh or whatever and I'll get that toy or toys out ready downstairs for them to play with. It puts dd in charge of her toys and her choice to share them. She responds well to it.

Anything she doesn't want to share she is welcome to hide in my bedroom, and from watching her this is obviously an important opt-out for her. Some days it is desparately important to her that some doll or toy or other is NOT in general circulation.

The only exception is her blanket which she doesn't have to put away and never has to share. If another child picks it up and dd isn't happy, I always quite cheerfully tell the other child that the blanket is dd's and not for sharing, but would the child like to play with X instead?

Oh, and we talk more about 'turns' and 'swapping' than sharing. I read somewhere that sharing is a tricky concept for them, but taking turns or swapping toys is more straightforward.

Message withdrawn

God i'm 36 and i hate sharing so totally understand why children find it so hard.

Think giving drinks etc is just being polite but i wouldn't expect a friend to come in my house and start putting on my clothes/using my perfume etc and to be told that i had to share.

Obviously i do encourage/make my children share but as others do - put away special toys before guests come.

Its so hard for children though although i'm unconvinced they'd just start doing it of their own volition if not encouraged to do so.

Hmmm.

I share books, clothes... but food I can be touchy about

My life would probably be easier if I hadn't encouraged sharing, but I think with DD now being 6 with aspergers, to stop forcing them to share would completely blow her mind.

I do love the fact that it is the Germans who think they are better sharing adults though

I have spent some time recently explaining to DS(6) that I don't feel it is reasonable to force DD(2) to share chocolate. This arises because he naturally shares his without being asked and gets (understandably) a little miffed when she hogs all of hers and says 'no, it's mine' even if asked

Toys are trickier - most of DD's are inherited from DS, but glossing over that detail, the nominated 'owner' is allowed reasonable priority, and snatching things / wanting them only because someone else has them is definitely frowned upon. Other than that, I encourage sharing/taking turns.

So that would be the same German aversion to sharing that means that if you overtake on an autobahn and take more than a nano second to get back into the inside lane (in your not-so-new, not-so-fast Ford) that it's OK for Herr Fast in a big Merc to tailgate you until you're terrified into getting out of 'his' lane.

I'm actually a Germanophile--love the country and find its history and culture fascinating. But this really hacks me off.

There is a big difference between sharing your own toys and sharing when out and about - I tell DS1 (2.8) to share at playgroup cos none of the toys are 'his'. Likewise pla
ying on the swings or wherever. At home I'd expect him to be hospitable and offer to share certain toys (and having been at playgroups/cm from an early age he's pretty good)

Also, surely one of the benefits of having more than one child is that they learn to share?