Social skills are
the ways we interact with
others. Having these skills can help us become confident, happy people who
are easy to get along with. However, not all of us develop them correctly
as we grow up. So we show you what you should know about social skills for children .
What
are social skills for children?
They include
verbal and nonverbal 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 the written and unspoken rules when
communicating with others. Children with a diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD), Pervasive Developmental Disorder ,
and Asperger 's have difficulties with social skills.
Why
are social skills important?
Social
skills are vital in
enabling a person to have and maintain positive interactions with others. Many
of these skills are crucial to making and keeping 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
arise in interactions.
It is also
important that people have "empathy" ,
that is, being able to put themselves in other people's shoes and recognize
their feelings. Since it allows them to respond in an understanding and
attentive way to how others feel.
What
are the building blocks needed to develop social skills?
- Attention and
concentration: sustained effort, performing activities without
distraction and being able to maintain that effort long enough to complete
the task.
- Receptive language (comprehension) : Comprehension
of language.
- Expressive
language (use) : The use of language through
speech, sign or alternative forms of communication. This to
communicate desires, needs, thoughts and ideas.
- Play skills: Voluntary participation
in self-motivated activities that are normally associated with
pleasure. Enjoy activities that can be goal-oriented, but not
necessarily.
- Pre-language skills: the ways we
communicate without using words. These include things like gestures,
facial expressions, imitation, joint attention, and eye contact.
- Self-regulation: The ability to
elicit, maintain, and change emotion, behavior, attention, and activity
level appropriate to 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.
Social
skills for children are:
- Cooperation: Interact in a
positive way, eg. taking turns, doing their share of a shared task.
- Sharing: For example,
treats, belongings, and ideas with others.
- Participation: join in and
"try it," even if you're not very good at something.
- Be patient: everyone has the
right to be heard and considered so that everyone learns to be patient and
wait their turn.
- Helping Others: Even young
children can help others to get work done or someone feel loved.
- Follow directions: Learning to
follow directions or rules helps keep us all safe and well.
- Staying on task: doing our job
and letting others do theirs.
- Accept differences: accept diversity
as a reality and respect everyone.
- Listen: learn to be an
active listener.
- Praise others and don't
use put-downs: Let people know when they've done well and don't be
mean when they haven't.
- Positive communication
and interaction: If you are nice to others, they are usually nice to
you. Yelling and bullying may get attention, but they won't win you
friends.
- Be polite and courteous: Always greet
people you know, visitors, and family friends.
- Use good manners when speaking,
eating or in public.
- Respect: ourselves,
others and property. And accept responsibility for what is said or
done.
- Be respectful of your rights
and those of others:
- Resolve conflicts when you have a
problem.
What
can be done to improve social skills in children?
- Play with your child: this will help
him develop joint attention and turn taking. You'll teach him about
shared interests, cooperation, and appropriate play with toys.
- Emotions: helps the child
understand and show their own emotions and recognize these emotions in
other people.
- Empathy: helps the child
to understand and recognize how other people feel in particular
situations.
- Social Stories: These are
stories used to teach social skills for specific children that may be
difficult to understand or confusing. The goal of the story is to
increase the child's understanding by describing a specific situation in
detail. In addition to suggesting an appropriate social response.
- Social Skills Groups:
These are
groups that are organized for the express purpose of mastering social
interaction with others.
What
activities can help improve social skills?
- Visuals: Create a rules
poster to remember when starting a conversation. For example, use a
friendly voice, make eye contact, use appropriate greetings such as
'hello'.
- Role play: practice game or
party scenarios where the child does not know anyone. Model and
create a list of different things you can say: To join other people who
are playing. To politely negotiate with your peers, for example, "I don't want that one. Can I
have the blue car, please?
- Sing songs: like 'If
you're happy and you know it' to help teach a child about different emotions.
- Masks: Create masks to
help improve eye contact.
- Activate turns: play turn games
eg board games. These will help to encourage a child to say whose
turn it is in the game. For example, “My turn”, “Your turn”.
- Games: play with the
child. But make sure that the child is not always the
"winner" so that he learns to "lose" in a
game. This will teach him to deal better when this happens with his
teammates.
- Bean Bag Conversation: Toss a bean bag
around a circle and each child will take a turn contributing to the
conversation. For example, ask a question, comment on what has been
said, add something related to the topic.
- Watch and Discuss – Play out
different situations and comment on appropriate and inappropriate
communication attempts. For example, being too close or too far from
another person, not using proper eye contact, interrupting a conversation.
What
can difficulties with social skills lead to?
When children
struggle with social skills, they may also struggle with:
- Making new friends.
- Maintain friendships
with peers.
- Communicate
effectively with unknown people during situations. These may include
asking for help in a store, asking for directions if they are lost, and
negotiating with someone with whom they have had a disagreement.
- Reading/comprehension
of social situations.
- Understand jokes and
figurative language during interactions with others.
Social skills for children are
the foundation for the early development of social understanding and
performance. It is what will help our little one to become a member of her
group. Lack or d
