This information is compiled from the article cited below:
Organizing Play – with preschoolers these are usually, “Let’s” statements, such as, “Let’s play trucks.” Often these “Let’s” statements are followed by suggestions about roles (e.g., “You be the driver”) or specific activities (e.g., “Roll it to me”).
Sharing – sharing takes many forms among preschoolers. Children with friends request in the form of, “Can I have some paint” and they also oblige share requests from peers.
Assisting Others – assisting also takes many forms at the preschool level. Children can help each other onto or off of an apparatus, they can tell or show a friend how to do something, or they can assist someone in distress.
Giving compliments – While these behaviors do not often occur among preschoolers they tend to have a powerful effect on the formation of friendships. Preschoolers compliment one another’s successes, buildings, and appearances.
In addition to engaging in these discrete behaviors, the formation of friendship is equally dependent upon two patterns of interaction. First, it is necessary for children to be reciprocal in their interactions. Reciprocity has two dimensions. Initially, children need to be responsive to the social bids of others. Also, over a period of time (say several months), it is important that there be a relatively equal number of occasions that each member of a friendship dyad starts an interaction. In addition to reciprocity, friendship patterns of interaction are also characterized by the length of interaction occurrences. That is, friendship pairs engage in more lengthy episodes.
Work Cited
Joseph, Gail E., and Phillip S. Strain. “You’ve Got to Have Friends.”
The Center on the Social and Emotional Foundations for Early Learning, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, November 2003, csefel.uiuc.edu. Accessed 13 2 2023.
