Can a 1-year-old share? What does it mean to share? How can we help a child turn into an adult who enjoys sharing? Here are some of my thoughts on sharing from ages 1 to 3.
What is Sharing?
Different behaviors get lumped under the label “sharing.” I think there are three main subtypes of sharing:
- Giving. Letting go of any object and giving it to another. Taking a piece of your cookie and putting it in someone else’s mouth. Lending a toy to a friend to take home. Giving is voluntary.
- Tolerating when another child touches and plays with valued things. The other child touches the items whether you want them to or not.
- Taking turns using something you and another child both want.
Giving: The Trade Up
Babies love to give, and they give freely. When Eytan was a baby, he loved to hand things to everyone around him. All babies are like this. I made a habit of “trading up” when he chose to relinquish a possession: Baby Eytan hands me his monkey. I hold the monkey, interact with it in a way that amuses him, and give it right back. Or, Baby Eytan hands me his monkey. I immediately give him a different toy that he likes. Giving always results in instant receiving. Dog trainers teach the Trade Up game to new puppy owners — it helps prevent resource guarding in the future. The puppy learns that “human hands coming near my treasure” results in “something even better,” and not in “I lose my treasure.”
Can young toddlers really play with one another?
I often hear that children are only capable of “parallel play” until around age three, or even five. Meaning, babies and young toddlers can play side by side, but they don’t interact with one another in a meaningful way. I didn’t find that to be the case. In fact, when Eytan was 1-1.5 years old, I noticed an interesting ritual that seemed instinctive and patterned: an initial object exchange when first interacting, followed by mutual play:
Object Trading Ritual
One child hands an object — a pinecone, a stick, whatever– to the second child. The second child interacts with the object briefly, then returns it to the first child. First child holds the object for a little, then hands it back to the second child. The object is exchanged three times, with a lot of positive facial expressions, and is then abandoned. From this point on, trust seems to have been established, and the children play. Peekaboo around a tree, peekaboo behind a fence, peekaboo behind Mom, peekaboo behind hands (you get it..,), “let’s bang on this thing together at the same time and laugh,” “Let’s collect rocks and put them on this pile together,” and other simple interactive games with lots of eye contact and smiling. I consistently saw the Object Trading Ritual in the 1-2 age range.
Maybe it’s the environment
Why do people believe children can’t play meaningfully at a young age? I wonder if it might be because of the environments in which we place them. If I put 1- and 2-year-old Eytan in a room full of novel toys, he absolutely ignored all other children and just wanted the toys. He only registered the other child in the room as a rival who wanted to take away the toys he was playing with, or as someone who showcased a fascinating toy that he wanted to take and play with himself.
Playgrounds were similar. If I met a friend and her child for a playdate at a playground, Eytan mostly ignored the child and was only interested in climbing. I was able to occasionally facilitate a “slide side-by-side” on a double-slide, but not much more.
However, take the kids out on a trail, a creek, a nature park, or a farm, and the most interesting thing out there is the other child. There are infinite rocks and sticks, so even though they’re wonderful objects, there’s no need to feel competitive over them. The environment provides lots of sensory stimulation, but nothing to possess.
The Rule of Possession
In situations where there were objects worth competing over, I consistently enforced what I call “The Rule of Possession.” I did the same thing with dogs and puppies before having Eytan — it makes sense to me behaviorally. The rule states that whoever has possession over an object gets to maintain possession over the object for as long as he or she likes. Snatching objects away is prohibited.
Benefits of the Rule of Possession
I wouldn’t like it if my friend walked up to me and took my phone out of my hand while I was in the middle of using it. I wouldn’t like a stranger picking up my phone and making a phone call without asking, even if I wasn’t using it. Why do we expect babies to be any different?
As an animal behavior consultant, I believe there’s something instinctive about The Rule of Possession. Dogs, for example, usually follow the rule. If one dog possesses a valued item, that dog usually gets to keep it. Under normal circumstances, a behaviorally normal dog won’t take away an object from another dog, even if one dog is large and the other small. If the other dog drops the object and walks away, even for a second, the object is fair game and can be snatched away.
I never allowed Eytan to snatch something out of someone else’s hand. No exceptions. You receive, you don’t take. I never allowed another child to snatch anything out of his hand, either. I ran this rule past the other moms at the beginning of each playdate, and they always seemed happy with it. Adults don’t have to intervene and try to make a child give something up; we only intervene if someone violates the rule and tries to snatch by force.
If you know you can play with an object until you are fully satisfied, you are not anxious when you see another child approaching you and your object. You are not forced to protect your rights to an object aggressively, because the adults back you up.
You’re also likely to move on to something else more quickly because you’re not focused on guarding the object. You get to fully enjoy the object and naturally move on.
Occasionally a child wanted to possess an object for a long time, but since no one was hovering trying to snatch the object away, guarding the object for the sake of guarding it got boring quickly.
I feel that in the long term, following The Rule of Possession works better than trying to make very young kids “share,” i.e. lose what they want and be left watching, jealous, and feeling that something was taken from them. I feel that the rule is simple enough for a baby and young toddler to understand and accept. I can’t take by force, no one can take from me by force.
(If a situation necessitated taking an object away, I did my best to “trade up.” I took the object away myself —rather than having the other child take it— and I provided something of high value in return.)
Bribing in the moment
Eytan found it very challenging to let friends touch his things when they visited us at home. He’s much better now. I think a little bit of bribing early on went a long way.
Before his friend came over, I told Eytan that the friend will be touching ALL of his toys. He said OK. Then I play-acted the part of the friend, saying “I’m Lior. I’m touching your excavator! I’m sitting on your train. I’m opening your toolbox!” Eytan said, “No!” I stopped and we talked about what he could do while the friend touched that particular toy.
I told Eytan that when I see him letting the friend play with something even when it’s hard for him, I will give him honey. When the friend came, and I saw Eytan beginning to struggle, I whispered “honey” in his ear. He backed off and let the friend play with the toy. I slipped a tiny spoon of honey into Eytan’s mouth (a few drops). After having done this two or three times, Eytan gained experience tolerating sharing in difficult-to-share situations, and no longer needed the honey. Now, we only have a problem if I’m deep in conversation with the adults and miss early cues indicating he’s not coping well, usually at the end of the evening when he’s tired.
The experience he gained sharing when it’s hard, even though I bribed him, is valuable. He saw that he got the object back, and that nothing bad happened. He was classically conditioned to have a positive emotional response when “other child touches my thing” (honey is a very powerful motivator for him). He became less possessive the next time.
Turn Taking
Around age two, I introduced the idea of formal turn-taking. The key to success, I think, is to establish the turn taking before the child takes possession of the object in the first place.
“You can play with this car only until the other boy comes back and wants to use it.”
“You can jump on the trampoline, but only 20 times. When you’re done jumping 20 times, you will have to get off, the other kid will jump for 20 times, and then you will be allowed to go again.”
Make it clear that his possession is temporary, it’s not “really his.” When the child expresses understanding, allow him to take possession.
With Eytan, turn-taking was always very context-specific and well-defined. I didn’t do it much until closer to age 3. Eytan’s abilities were stretched to the limits when we did turn-taking at age 2, but now at 3 it’s almost effortless. I don’t think children need to be in a position to have to take turns before age 3, if it can be avoided.
Building Relationships of Sharing
I believe that children innately enjoy sharing with one another and giving to others. We are social creatures, and giving feels good. The more experience a child has enjoying the pleasures of giving, the more of a giver he will become. I encourage pleasurable giving at every opportunity.
Humans don’t share indiscriminately with everyone they meet, however. They share with friends, developing relationships of mutual benefit and trust. One way of speeding up this process is The Toy Exchange.
The Toy Exchange -relationship building
The Toy Exchange works like this. Every time Eytan meets a friend for a playdate, the children exchange one toy. The toy is kept until the next time the two meet, at which point they return the toy and exchange a new toy. I ask Eytan to approve the toy at home ahead of time, and pass the bag over to the other mom discreetly when we get together so he doesn’t suddenly feel possessive over the loss of his toy. When we get home, we open the bag we received from the friend to discover what Eytan got to borrow this time. I make a big deal of how nice the child is for letting Eytan borrow this toy. Every time we play with it, I reiterate “Paloma lent this to you, isn’t she a nice girl?”
The Toy Exchange allows us to have lots of free toys we don’t have to store in our apartment for more than a week or two. Lending toys frees up space in our apartment, and makes the items new and fresh when they return to us.
But, most importantly, Eytan learns that friends give to one another. He learns to develop trusting relationships with specific friends. Like humans do. This is more important to me than a universal “share with everyone.”
Reframing reality
A final tool I’d like to share is “reframing reality.”
When an adult experiences a social situation that feels uncertain, the adult does an internal check and frames (interprets) reality in a healthy way. Little children have neither the experience nor the ability to really do that on their own. They need us to do the emotional work for them.
A “reality reframe” includes true observable facts, an empowering interpretation of the situation, and an appealing course of action the child can take which will satisfy his needs.
Eytan turns to me when he feels something unpleasant. “Ima, Eleanor took my spatula!” he’ll say in a questioning cry. I get down to his eye level and gently reframe reality for him, in a respectful tone: “She’s playing with it right now. She didn’t snatch it out of your hand. It was on the hook. She can play with it for as long as she likes. It’s so fun having friends over. Look, she’s cooking eggs! You can cook together on another frying pan. You can use the other tools. You can cook food at your restaurant together.” He accepts this way of seeing reality and gets back to his play.
Thanks for reading through my post, I hope you enjoyed it. If you have other useful tips, please don’t hesitate and… share them.
🙂
CHILD COOPERATIVE CARE & Enrichment 
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