"Competition Between Siblings"

I have four-and-a-half-year-old fraternal twin boys. K imagines all the time that he's in a race and that he's always the winner. He imagines this when he's drinking milk, eating dinner, or getting to the car first. He is quick to announce to his brother that he is always first, always the winner. His twin brother, Z, has a very different imagination and winning is barely a part of it. However, he is sensitive to always being told "I won, you lost." or "I'm the fastest" or "I'm the best and you're not." "I'm taller, and taller is better."
    I have intervened a thousand times in the last couple years repeating in some form the message of how special each of them is, and how different they are, and how cool it is they get to learn from each other and about each other. All of this has paid off in terms of them having a wonderful relationship (for the most part), with the exception of this repetitive "I'm better than you."
    Z has told K that he has a different story in his imagination, or he tells him that he's hurt, or he asks him why he always has to be the winner. Sometimes he just starts crying. Z told his grandma, "K is better at everything." That broke my heart.
    I have asked K to not say hurtful words to Z, and I've just plain said "Stop" after the tenth time of trying to help him say things a different way. I'm losing my patience. I know that some things will get worked out over time in their relationship as siblings. But it still breaks my heart. Help! What do you think?

-- mom who's figuring it out in California

It sounds like you have done wonderful relationship-building with your children and that you have had lots of success in seeing their relationship come to fruition. The issue of competitiveness that you raise is very common for children starting around four and throughout the next few years. It often plays out with siblings, cousins, good friends, or special friends.
     There are three main factors which give rise to the intense competition that sometimes emerges at this age. The first is cognitive or intellectual development. At four, some children are able to hold two different ideas in their heads at one time. This is a necessary prerequisite for comparing two things. They can look at two cars and determine which one is bigger. They can come inside on a hot day and notice that it's cooler inside than it is outside.
      The second factor is that four-year-olds are just getting a sense of themselves in the larger world. As they look out at all of the people around them who are bigger and more competent, they sometimes feel small and incompetent. Comparing themselves and coming out "first" helps compensate for some of their feelings of smallness.
      The last factor is that we live in a highly competitive society. Everywhere children look there are messages about being smarter, richer, faster. Our children experiment with competitiveness as a way to understand the culture they live in.
      You have discovered many wonderful ways of responding to your son's competitiveness. We will review what you have created and make a few more suggestions:
. Acknowledge children's competence. Since most of children's claims of being first, best, fastest, or tallest are about wanting to feel competent and proud, you can simply acknowledge that they are "fast," "tall," or good at something. "Wow, you did eat your dinner fast. Are you digesting it fast, too?" Or, "You are a fast runner." Or, "You do build amazing things with your Legos."
. Acknowledge competence by the use of descriptive words, rather than evaluative words. "You are not only a fast runner, you are a smooth runner. You look like a gazelle when you run." Or, "You are tall! You have long arms, long legs and you are growing taller every single day." Or, "You did get to the car fast. You probably saved us two minutes by getting here so fast."
. Help children celebrate uniqueness and diversity. You have given your children the message that each of them is unique and special, that their differences are an asset and that each of them can learn things from and teach things to the other. You can also tell them stories about how you and your friends share your unique skills with each other: "My friend and I just taught each other something. My friend is good at building and he taught me how to build my own table and I am good at writing, so I helped him write a story."
      Even though they can't always act on this information, children are taking it in and putting it with their stores of knowledge. These are hard concepts for four-year olds to understand, but eventually they will be able to make use of them.
. Add your own twists on your son's urge to compete. Try recreating some of the contests that your son sets up: "You ate your dinner the fastest that time and your brother ate his the neatest." While this can sometimes serve to perpetuate the competition, if you can get very silly and prolific with your categories, often the kid's energy will turn towards making up new categories: "You ate yours the laughingest and he ate his the chewiest. You ate yours the standing-upist and he ate his the sitting-downest."
. Capitalize on your child's desire to compare. Comparisons are intellectually challenging and interesting. You can offer your child other things to compare which don't hurt people's feelings. He could use a tape measure, a chain of paper clips or a string that he could mark with tape to measure things-to see if he can find the widest tree, the longest couch, the thickest book, the biggest bug.
      You can also introduce new categories for comparison. Let's see if you can find the most colorful flower, the saltiest thing and the sweetest thing at dinner, the oldest thing in our house.
      Your child can also be redirected to doing self-comparisons: "Let's see how much taller you are than you were last year." Or, "A week ago you weren't a bike rider and now you are." Or, "You have learned to put your shoes on the right feet. I remember when you were a baby and you always switched them to the wrong feet."
. Provide creative redirection. There may also be ways you can redirect K's need to compare in a direction that will include his brother in a more positive way. You could offer him this alternative: "If you want to do a comparison with your brother, you need to find one thing you are better at and one thing he is better at." Or, "You can say one thing you are good at and your brother can say one thing he is good at, and I won't let anyone argue with either of you about what you say you are good at." Or, "If you need to compare yourself to something, you can compare yourself to things or animals, but not people. You could say, I'm taller than that tree, or I'm faster than a jet plane or I'm smarter than this rock." Providing creative outlets for your son's emerging need to categorize and compare will enable him to take some of the pressure off his brother.
. Help your child pay attention to his brother's feelings. It sounds like both you and Z have worked to help K see that people get hurt feelings when he puts them down with comparisons: "It hurts Z's feelings when you say you are the best and he is not. You can tell him that you are good at climbing. That doesn't hurt his feelings, but when you tell him that he isn't good, or that you are better, it does hurt his feelings."
. Set a very clear limit. Once you have provided lots of information, feedback and alternative ways for K to proclaim his competence and practice the art of comparison, you may need to set a firm limit. A firm limit is a clear statement of what is and is not allowed, using follow-through to make sure the child is successful: "I'm not going to let you hurt your brother's feelings by saying you are the tallest and that taller is better. You can stop yourself from saying it or you can go into the other room until you are done." You may need to take him into the other room, out of earshot of his brother.

For related questions, see "Sibling Spats" and "Helping Children Deal with Conflict."