Do your children compare themselves to their siblings

[18yearstooold]

Dd2 is in year 6

They've been doing some assessments in the last week with results given out today

Dd is doing absolutely fine -not brain surgeon fine but I'm pleased with her result and I've told her

Unfortunately it's not as good as her older sister when she was in year 6 and this is ALL dd2 is focusing on

I've never compared them so don't know where this comes from

I just wish she could be happy with her own achievement

I only have the one child, but I know several families where the comparison - by the children, not parents - of GCSE and A Level results has caused problems.

Maybe for DD2 you could praise her for something she is obviously better at than her sister, such as playing an instrument or a sport.

My DD compares herself to her older brother. It upsets her that she gets lower levels than he did at her age. DD gets better effort marks than DS, who is a lazy toad. DD started it, but now DS has picked up on it and has started quoting bits of the national curriculum that DD should know by her age, which is making her realise she is behind. I find it all very difficult, though I reckon in the long run that Dd will do well, she is a finisher and works really hard at things she likes, DS is clever, but lazy, so unless he changes his attitude, won't do so well when grown up. I try to explain this to them, but not sure I am succeeding.

We have an even worse situation. Last term older DS got worse levels than younger DD. I've also done the "children are better at different things talk" and pointed out that younger DD is exceptional rather than him doing badly, but he still thinks he is rubbish

I think it is quite a natural thing for siblings to do. I did it, I know I did. I never got anywhere near the grades my sister did, she was the best at just about everything possible, just one of those people. HOWEVER she used to compare herself to me I discovered once we were adults, she thought I was so much better at other non academic things.

My girls do it too, age 5 and 7, the younger one in particular comparing herself to the elder one but equally the elder one finds a lot of physical stuff more difficult (probably dyspraxic to some degree) so she can be quite jealous of her younger sister and how easy she finds things.

I think the best way to approach it is to really build her self esteem about what she CAN do, encourage her to try something her sister doesn't do. I took up drama because I couldn't compete with my sister at music but she had no interest in drama (nor did I really to start with but I was good at it and it helped me greatly in so many ways). My parents always praised my planning and organising skills too which are strong points of mine. things she does she has no idea is a skill because it comes naturally to her, if you draw her attention to these skills carefully then she will really start to value her talents and herself and once she is more confident in her own skills and talents then she will probably compare herself yet.

She's way better than her sister in English and the arts but just won't believe that

Makes me sad to see her so down on herself

I think it's usual that children will compare. Because their siblings are, in some ways, their "norm". I know it's not just academic results that can be compared-things like where they went on a school trip in year 1 type of thing. They tend to assume their experiences will be very similar.
My experience is that they do tend to compare negatively and think "I did rubbish compared to them in maths" not noticing that they did better in Reading, writing and science.

I wouldn't go with what Leeds said because it may make them more competitive, and set them up to be the "academic one" and the (eg) "musical one".

I felt I was the non-academic one from our family. That was my assessment not my parents. I got into Oxbridge, my siblings didn't.

My children do but its not much of an issue as there is 5 years between them, DD is at a very similar stage to DS was at her age and DS enjoys encouraging her.

My siblings are really bad for it though. There are 7 of us still in education, I'm at uni, big bro at college doing an access course and 5 still at school (spread between year 6 and year 12). The comparisons are endless, luckily in our case the younger ones are getting much higher scores than me and I'm old enough not to get too down by it, especially as I helped teach them to read and write so am claiming their successes as proof of my teaching ability

I still compare myself to my sister, ages 36 (Though not my brother weirdly). I would definitely encourage differing hobbies. Doing things will bring more confidence than telling her she is better. If she is interested in English or the arts and your other DD isn't find a children's book group where she can talk to other kids about books or get her to enter a kids book review or poetry competition. Or find an art group, or take her to galleries. Something that is her own and that her sister can't nick! speaking from experience