How to develop social skills in a child

6 Ways to Improve Your Child's Social Skills

Few things can be more frustrating than watching your child struggle to
make friends or having a difficult time fitting into certain social settings.
There are several steps parents can take to improve their child's social skills.

1. Follow Their Interests

Enjoying others will come more naturally when a child is doing something they are genuinely interested in. Whether it's participating in a favorite sport, playing an instrument they like or being part of a club they're interested in, this is the first step toward building social skills. It also places a child around like-minded individuals that the child will probably feel more at ease with. While it's important to be able to socialize with those of varying interests, starting out with other kids who like the same things is an excellent way to more easily build social skills.

2. Learn to Ask Questions

Sometimes when children get nervous or a conversation lags, they may become more introverted and ultimately struggle in future social situations. According to the Center for Development & Learning there are several ways children can initiate and carry on positive conversations with others. One important way is to ask questions. The best way to find out about others and form connections is to ask questions that specifically pertain to the person the child is talking with. Encourage your child to ask questions that can't be answered with just a yes or no.

3. Practice Role Playing

Pretend-play, with both younger and older children, is a great way for kids to actively practice their social skills. LD Online gives parents practical tips for effective role-playing. Have your child pretend to be the person they have difficulty talking to or getting along with. This will give you an idea of what this person is like, or at least how your child perceives this particular person. Then switch roles to see how your child does when pretending to interact with the person. Suggest ways your child can more effectively talk with the individual. Don't forget to include body language, such as smiling and making eye contact, when advising your child.

4. Teach Empathy

If children have a better understanding of how others feel, they are much more likely to feel connected to other people and form positive bonds. Parents suggest teaching empathy by talking about different situations and scenarios with your child. Ask how other people might feel when each of these things happen. Part of teaching empathy is to help children learn how to actively listen to others. This involves focusing on what others are saying and then thinking about what the speaker has said once the conversation is over.

5. Know Your Child's Limits

Some children are simply more social than others. A child who is shy and introverted should not be expected to interact in the same way as a child who is naturally outgoing. Some children are comfortable in large settings, while others find it easier to relate to their peers when in smaller groups. It's also important to understand a child's time limits. Younger children and those with special needs may only feel comfortable socializing for an hour or two.

6. Be a Good Role Model

It's important to be consciously aware of how you interact with others when your child is watching. Are you asking questions of others and then taking the time to actively listen? Do you show genuine empathy for friends and family in your life? The Center for Parenting Education states that being an effective role model requires conscious effort and forethought. Children are constantly watching the adults in their lives.

It's important to remember that it will take time for your child to develop good social skills. Social skills are something that are developed and improved upon over a lifetime.

Social Skills - Kid Sense Child Development

What are social skills?

Social skills are the skills we use everyday to interact and communicate with others. They include verbal and non-verbal communication, such as speech, gesture, facial expression and body language. A person has strong social skills if they have the knowledge of how to behave in social situations and understand both written and implied rules when communicating with others. Children with a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Pervasive Developmental Disorder (Not Otherwise Specified) and Asperger’s have difficulties with social skills.

Why are social skills important?

Social skills are vital in enabling an individual to have and maintain positive interactions with others. Many of these skills are crucial in making and sustaining friendships. Social interactions do not always run smoothly and an individual needs to be able to implement appropriate strategies, such as conflict resolution when difficulties in interactions arise. It is also important for individuals to have ’empathy’ (i.e. being able to put yourself into someone else’s shoes and recognise their feelings) as it allows them to respond in an understanding and caring way to how others are feeling.

What are the building blocks necessary to develop social skills?

Attention and concentration: Sustained effort, doing activities without distraction and being able to hold that effort long enough to get the task done.
Receptive (understanding) language: Comprehension of language.
Expressive (using) language: The use of language through speech, sign or alternative forms of communication to communicate wants, needs, thoughts and ideas.
Play skills: Voluntary engagement in self motivated activities that are normally associated with pleasure and enjoyment where the activities may be, but are not necessarily, goal oriented.
Pre-language skills: The ways in which we communicate without using words and include things such as gestures, facial expressions, imitation, joint attention and eye-contact.
Self regulation: The ability to obtain, maintain and change one’s emotion, behaviour, attention and activity level appropriate for a task or situation in a socially acceptable manner.
Executive functioning: Higher order reasoning and thinking skills.
Planning and sequencing: The sequential multi-step task or activity performance to achieve a well-defined result.

How can you tell if my child has problems with social skills?

If a child has difficulties with social skills they might:

Use fleeting eye contact, does not consistently use eye contact or stares at you fixedly.
Not be able to take turns when talking to their communication partner.
Struggle with using appropriate body language (e.g. stands too close/far to another person).
Fail to use polite forms of communication (e.g. saying: please, thank-you, hello and good-bye).
Be unable to start and end conversations appropriately.
Interrupt others frequently.
Be unable to maintain a topic of conversation and provides irrelevant comments during a conversation.
Talk ‘at you’ in a conversation as opposed to engaging in a two way conversation ‘with’ you.
Not ask appropriate questions.
Repeat information in conversation and tend to talk about topics of their own interest (e.g. trains, a favourite TV show/person).
Show little or no interest in what the other person has to say.
Fail to understand jokes and language, such as sarcasm, idioms and non-literal information (e.g. ‘This place is a pig sty!’).
Interpret what you say in a very literal way (e.g. when you say “Can you open the door?” the child “yes” without moving to actually open the door).
Talk with unusual speed, stress, rhythm, intonation, pitch and/or tone of voice.
Be unable to understand different tones of voice or read facial cues.
Fail to ask for clarification if they are confused or if the situation is unclear to them.
Struggle to respond appropriately when asked to change their actions.
Tend to disclose (excessively) personal information to unfamiliar people or strangers.
Appear unaware of others and fail to read other people’s feelings based on their verbal and non-verbal cues.
Be unable to respond to teasing, anger, failure and disappointment appropriately.
Be unable to adjust or modify their language appropriately according to the communication situation.
Lack empathy (i.e. is not able to imagine what it is like to be somebody else or in their situation).
Lack imagination.
Appear self-centred.
Fail to understand the consequences of their actions.

What other problems can occur when a child has social skill difficulties?

When a child has social skill difficulties, they might also have difficulties with:

Behaviour: The child’s actions, usually in relation to their environment (e.g. a child may engage in behaviour, such as refusing to go to social events including birthday parties or engage in inappropriate behaviour, such as tugging on a peer’s hair or yelling at someone to get their attention).
Sensory processing: The child may have trouble attending or focusing and have difficulty interpreting information they receive from the environment.
Completing academic work (e.g. the child may misinterpret verbal or written instructions for tasks and/or struggle with imaginative writing).
Receptive (understanding) language: Comprehension of language.
Expressive (using) language: The use of language through speech, sign or alternative forms of communication to communicate wants, needs, thoughts and ideas.
Articulation: Clarity of speech sounds and spoken language.
Fluency: The smoothness or flow with which sounds, syllables, words and phrases are produced when talking.
Voice: The sound that we hear when someone talks which is unique to each person.
Self regulation: The ability to obtain, maintain and change one’s emotion, behaviour, attention and activity level appropriate for a task or situation in a socially acceptable manner.
Executive functioning: Higher order reasoning and thinking skills.

What can be done to improve social skills?

Play with your child to help develop joint attention, turn-taking, shared interests, cooperation and appropriate play with toys.
Emotions: Help the child to understand and display their own emotions and to recognise these emotions in other people.
Empathy: Help the child to understand and recognise how other people are feeling in particular situations.
Social stories: These are stories which are used to teach children specific social skills that they may find difficult to understand or are confusing. The goal of the story is to increase the child’s understanding by describing in detail a specific situation and suggesting an appropriate social response.
Social skill groups: These are groups run with the express purpose of mastering social interaction with others.

What activities can help improve social skills?

Visuals: Make up a poster of rules to remember when starting a conversation (e. g. using a friendly voice, making eye contact, using appropriate greetings, such as ‘hello’).
Role play: Practise playground/party scenarios where the child does not know anybody. Model and create a list of different things you can say:
- To join others who are playing (e.g. “Can I play too?”).
- To introduce yourself (e.g. “Hi my name is ….”).
- To politely negotiate with peers (e.g. “I don’t want that one. Can I have the blue car please?”).
Sing songs, such as ‘If you’re happy and you know it’ to help teach a child about different emotions.
Masks: Make masks together to help improve eye contact.
Turn taking: Play turn taking games (e.g. board games) to encourage a child to say whose turn it is in the game (e.g. “My turn”, “Your turn”).
Games: Play board games with the child. Make sure the child is not always the ‘winner’ so that they learn about ‘losing’ in a game and are able to cope better when this happens with their peers.
Bean bag conversation: Throw a bean bag around a circle and each child takes a turn to contribute to the conversation. Think of different ways to contribute to the conversation (e.g. ask a question, comment on what has been said, add something related to the topic).
Watch and comment: Role play different situations and comment about appropriate and inappropriate attempts of communication (e.g. standing too close or too far from another person, not using appropriate eye contact, interrupting a conversation).

Why should I seek therapy if I notice difficulties with social skills in my child?

Therapeutic intervention to help a child with social skills difficulties is important to:

Help a child to engage appropriately with others during play, conversation and in interactions.
Help a child to develop friendships at school and when accessing out of school activities (e.g. playing sport, attending a group such as Scouts).
Help a child maintain friendships with peers.
Help a child to behave appropriately during interactions with familiar people (e.g. parents, siblings, teachers, family friends) and unfamiliar individuals (e.g. adults and children they may need to engage with during excursions and when visiting places, such as the park or swimming pool).
Assist a child in developing their awareness of social norms and to master specific social skills (e.g. taking turns in a conversation, using appropriate eye contact, verbal reasoning, understanding figurative language).
Develop appropriate social stories to help teach the child about how to respond in specific social situations.
Some children require explicit teaching about how to interact and communicate with others as these skills do not come naturally to them.

If left untreated what can difficulties with social skills lead to?

When children have difficulties with social skills, they might also have difficulties with:

Making new friends.
Maintaining friendships with peers.
Communicating effectively with unfamiliar individuals during situations including asking for assistance in a shop, asking for directions if they are lost and negotiating with someone with whom they have had a disagreement.
Reading/understanding social situations.
Understanding jokes and figurative language during interactions with others, and when watching television shows and movies and reading books.
Coping with failure.

What type of therapy is recommended for social skill difficulties?

If your child has difficulties with social skills, it is recommended they consult a Speech Therapist.

If there are multiple areas of concern (i.e. beyond just social skills) both Occupational Therapy and Speech Therapy may well be recommended to address the functional areas of concern. This is the benefit of choosing Kid Sense provides both Occupational Therapy and Speech Therapy.

How to develop social intelligence in a child: 7 tips from a psychologist

Publishing house "Alpina Publisher" 123007, Moscow, st. 4th Magistralnaya, 5, building 1 +74951200704

December 13, 2017

2310 views

6 minutes to read

Success in life is often achieved by people from whom neither teachers nor parents expected it. “A bully, a slacker, a C student” suddenly turns out to be much more successful than his classmates, who spent all their childhood sitting at textbooks. The answer is not in "accidental luck" or "happy fate", but in social intelligence. Our social adaptation, the ability to understand people and, ultimately, success depend on how developed it is.

Social intelligence, unlike formal intelligence, can be developed. And it is better to start doing this from an early age. How exactly?

Pay attention to who and how the child communicates. To begin with, we need to take the most objective position and look at the child's social circle. Where and with whom does he spend his free time? Does he have real (and not virtual) friends with whom he meets regularly, visits them? Does he have the opportunity to choose friends on his own? Or do we conduct a thorough audit of his acquaintances and, in an attempt to protect him from bad influence, we forbid him to communicate with "unequal", "bad" boys and girls? Does he know how to get out of difficult situations, resolve conflicts, or does he run to his parents for help?
Expand the child's social circle. By limiting the child's contacts, we inhibit the development of his social skills. Growing up, he goes out into the world, not understanding how to live in it and how to interact with people who live in this world. There is a rule in aikido training: each athlete must work out the same technique with the maximum number of sparring partners, because with each of them it will be a little different - the athlete learns to see the strengths and feel for the weaknesses of the opponent, adapt to his height , weight, speed, and at the same time find their advantages. That is why the child must communicate with people of different ages, different material wealth and cultural levels. He must practice his social skills.
Give experience of various social situations. Relationships with people are always a risk. We are all different, someone likes you, and someone annoys and repels you. Someone can treat you kindly, and someone can intrigue. For full development, children need unplanned, unexpected, sometimes even conflict situations. The experience of getting into and out of such situations helps to develop social immunity. The child got into a fight - let's not rush to figure out who is right and who is wrong. It’s better to ask him what happened, and together we will discuss how it was possible to resolve the conflict peacefully and how to behave in the future.
Use social equipment. Even if a child is driven in a car with a personal driver, it is useful for him to take a ride on the subway or tram from time to time. Traveling by public transport is an ideal option for practicing social skills. Despite the apparent simplicity, even the ability to correctly find a place in the cabin is developed gradually. Which one is considered good? The place where we do not interfere with others and no one interferes with us, from where you can clearly see what is happening around. The task of “squeezing between people” is solved much easier if you turn to your neighbors with the words: “Are you not going out now? Please let me pass!” The child learns from experience that words are much more effective than brute force.
Teach communication boundaries. For successful social interaction, it is very important for a child to learn to understand the boundaries of the personal space of other people and try not to violate them. This is especially true for the boundaries of strangers - in public places, on the street, in a restaurant, on an airplane, on a train. For example, a child rushes screaming around the restaurant from table to table - you need to stop him and say that he is bothering everyone. And if he does not understand, punishment should follow. Demanding compliance with external boundaries, we thereby give impetus to the formation of internal self-control, that is, the ability to monitor ourselves, cope with our impulses, emotional outbursts.
Learn to understand your feelings and the feelings of other people. Life sets tasks for the child, for the fulfillment of which it is necessary to achieve something from people with different views, values and characters. To successfully cope with these tasks, it is necessary to be able to understand and anticipate the behavior of other people, evaluate their motivation, intentions and determine who can be trusted and who cannot. But often we ourselves do not know what we feel - resentment or anger, annoyance with ourselves or envy of another, joy or satisfaction. The ability to recognize your feelings is a very useful skill. Only by learning to understand our feelings can we learn to empathize, that is, to understand the feelings of other people.
Teach the child to respond adequately in various communication situations. In the big world, the child will have to solve his own problems, win a place under the sun, determine who is a friend and who is not. Somewhere you have to step aside, somewhere you need to agree and compromise, somewhere you need to actively insist on your own and directly express your opinion. To do this, the child's arsenal should have many ways to respond and cope with different situations. The more diverse the child's experience, the more rehearsals he had, the more convincingly he will play the performance called "life".

Our poor rich children

Marina Melia

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How to develop social skills in a child - Child development

Parents are upset when they see how their children cannot share a toy among themselves or cannot find friends. If a child has developed social skills, he can cope with such difficult situations. Socially adapted children know how to make friends, play, start conversations with peers and adults.

Social skill: “The ability to ask”

It can be difficult for a child to approach other children and ask to play with them. In the end, children may answer, “No.” Fear of rejection can prevent a child from even trying, and then they will miss out on the fun of playing with peers, as well as the opportunity to learn something new in the process of playing.

The child is most successful when he first finds out what the peer group is doing, then finds out how he can be useful, and then invites him to join the game. For example, if the children are playing school, he might ask, "Can I be a student?"

How to help your child learn to ask

Watch other children play with your child. Ask him leading questions: “What do you think Sasha uses cubes for? Does he have enough dice to share with you? Maybe we need to look for more cubes so you can play with Sasha?” Invite your child to play with someone else. For him, it will be easier than joining a large group.

Social skill: "The ability to carry on a conversation"

Children usually need some practice before they learn how to talk - take turns talking, not interrupting and listening to the other person. Introverted children require someone to start the conversation and keep it going. Extroverts, on the contrary, must learn not to interrupt the interlocutor and give him the opportunity to speak.

How to help a child to learn how to talk

A good way to develop this skill in a child is the example of parents and role-playing games. Show your child how to communicate properly by talking to him as often as possible.

Ask for his opinion on various issues and show genuine interest in what he has to say. If his speech is too long, carefully bring him back to the topic of conversation.

Play games in which everyone takes turns playing their turn. Make sure your child has opportunities for imaginative play. Scripted games: "Let's imagine that ..." will help him see different situations from a different point of view.

Social skill: "Understanding the emotions of others"

To fully participate in social situations and develop relationships with others, children need to read the emotions of the peers they play and interact with. Then they will be able to understand them and respond appropriately. This requires confidence from the child, because it is quite difficult to interpret the feelings of another person. If a confident child sees that two of his peers are arguing, he understands that now is not the right time to start the game. Moreover, he may try to defuse the situation. Or, if the child feels their friend is sad, they can offer support.

How to help a child to understand people's emotions

First of all, teach your child to identify his own emotions: “You have a smile on your face! You must be feeling happy” or “I see tears on your face. Are you sad?" After that, you can suggest how to apply this skill to others: “Sasha seems angry. What do you think happened?" or “How do you think Anya felt when she fell off the swing? How can we help her?"

Social skill: "Self-confidence"

When a child is generally well, it also has a positive effect on his social skills. If he understands that making mistakes or failing is normal, it is easier for him to express his opinion, ask for help or communicate with each other. If a child is denied something, he does not take it personally and is ready to insist on his own, while not going beyond the bounds of politeness.

How to help your child gain self-confidence

It may seem paradoxical, but children must fail in order to succeed. They need to know that they have to try something over and over again - and in the end, they will succeed. The key to mastering new skills is self-confidence.

It is also necessary to properly praise the child.