Sharing is fun! It just involves a lot of crying.

When N learned to crawl, he would often crawl over to his sister and take whatever she was holding out of her hands, probably because whatever object is moving is the most attractive. Sometimes, this would mean that his head was in her lap, N not having figured out that he was capable of a grab-n-go. Hence, N's head became the moving object, and E would grab fistfuls of N's hair. Let the screaming begin!

Now, E has learned how to take things back from N, something she does from time to time. N has yet to make this into an opportunity to learn about tug-o-war: he just cries in reaction.

Hence, learning to share.

Yesterday morning, E was holding a giant blueberry toy (about the size of a medium tomato). N took the blueberry, E took it back, and N started crying. JM saw this as an opportunity to teach sharing, which involves the parent shuttling the contested toy back and forth between the children, explaining what is happening, and counting out loud the time of the sharing interval. It sounds like this:

• (N is crying because E has taken the blueberry)
• "E, it is N's turn."
• (E immediately starts to cry as JM takes the blueberry and hands it to N).
• "1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Now it is E's turn."
• (N immediately starts to cry as JM returns the blueberry to E. E continues to cry for a few seconds once regaining possession.)
• Repeat over an over again until B goes mad.

I don't imagine this is common for parents of two children of different ages. If that's the case, I would imagine that the older of the two children has learned a bit about sharing (perhaps a similar exercise), and can be verbally encouraged to share with the less comprehending younger sibling. Having two children who do not understand sharing seems a bit of a challenge.