As your child grows up to school age, they will have learned many social skills and will know how to engage with other children and understand how other people feel in different situations. They will also be more able to understand how to act in different settings and situations.
Its important that children have strong social skills so that they are able to make friends and maintain good mental health. Learning good social skills will help your child all the way into their adulthood, however conditions like autism and ADHD can make the development of social skills more difficult.
As your child gets older, having good social skills become more and more important and if they have good social skills during early childhood it is a good sign that they will have an easier time when they become adults. If you think that your child is struggling, there are a few different things you can focus on to help them develop social skills and have an easier time in school.
Politeness
Being able to be polite and understanding to other people are very important as people will not want to be around someone as much if they are not nice to them. The best thing to teach them is when to say “please” and “thank you”, by saying these to your child you’ll leave an impression on them on how to speak to other people. The best thing you can do to help them with politeness is to be a good role model for your children and reward politeness when it is appropriate to do so.
Cooperating
Cooperating is just as important for children as it is for adults. Being able to cooperate in classrooms and on playgrounds can help other children enjoy playing and working with your child. If your child is struggling to cooperate you can help them by creating opportunities around your home to work together on problems and tasks like cleaning up toys or doing the dishes.
Listening
Good listening skills are important in the classroom as well as when you are talking to your friends. Making sure your child is able to listen properly will help them absorb information and understand how other people are feeling. If you need to help them with their listening skills you could ask them to repeat things that have been said to them and remind them that its rude to interrupt.
Following instructions
The ability to follow instructions is important both at school and at home. Not being able to do so could mean that you get into trouble or you could get into danger. This can be a bit more difficult to teach your children because when you are giving them instructions you need to think about if the instructions you are giving are clear and easy to understand. Avoid giving too many instructions at once and avoid phrasing instructions like questions. Say thank you when they have done something that you have told them to do.
Empathy
Being able to understand how another person is feeling is a really important factor when it comes to making friends, especially in childhood. Its tricky to be really good at being empathetic as it can be difficult to be able to understand what other people are feeling and it’s not something to worry about too much if your child doesn’t understand how other people feel right away. Empathy comes with age and time and the more time they spend with other people the better they will be at understanding other people.
Eye contact
Children may avoid eye contact for a number of reasons, it could be because they are shy or uncomfortable around the people or person that they are talking to. They could also be uninterested in what is being said to them or they do not like who is talking to them. However, a long-term issue with eye contact could be a sign of a social disorder and could be misinterpreted by other people as them being rude, so it is really important that you offer help to children who are struggling with eye contact. Like other social skills, positive reinforcement and rewards are good things you can do.
Sharing
Being able to keep friends is often dependent on being able to share. This can include sharing toys or treats and if your child isn’t good at sharing it could lead to difficult friendships. Not having good sharing skills doesn’t automatically mean that they have poor friendship skills, its just a sign that there’s things to work on. If you want to help them, then positive reinforcement is good, you could try and point out good examples of sharing when you see it and offer rewards when your child shares.
Social disorders
There are a number of disorders that can affect your child’s ability to develop social skills, for example autism. At this age you will be more able to see signs of autism than at younger ages. These signs include:
Not responding to their name
Avoiding eye contact
Not smiling when you smile at them
Getting very upset when they don’t like a taste, smell, sound or texture
Repetitive movements, such as flapping their hands, flicking their fingers or rocking their body back and forth
Not talking as much as other children
Not engaging with pretend play
Repeating phrases
The signs of autism are different between boys and girls. Autistic girls may:
Hide some of the typical signs of autism by copying how other children act and play
Back away from social situations that they find difficult
Look like they are coping better in social situations
Show fewer repetitive actions or behaviours
If you think that your child might be autistic or have any other social or learning disorders you can speak to:
Making sure that your child is safe online is really important. As they are getting older their relationship with other people may grow to be online, and they can use the internet to talk to their friends such as when they are playing games.
It’s good to talk to your child about what they do on the internet and what the safest things for them to do is. It can be confusing talking to children who spend a lot of time online as they may use language or slang that you do not understand, and learning about the games or apps that they play on can be overwhelming because of how many there are on offer.
If you’re struggling to figure out the best way to start talking to them about what they do online you could try:
Make sure you use language that they can understand
Try to find out what websites, apps or games they use so that you can understand what they are doing
If you suspect that they may be being groomed or speaking to someone online that they shouldn’t be go to the police or to the Child Exploitation and Online Protection service (CEOP Safety Centre).
You can set up filters on with your WiFi to block certain websites, so if you are worried that your child is viewing inappropriate contents you can make sure that they can’t access it anymore. You could also try setting up routines with your child so that they know when they are allowed to be on the internet and when they aren’t, for example they can go online after they have finished their homework but need to turn off for a little while before they go to sleep, and they can’t bring devices to the table when you eat together as a family.
Social skills
As your child grows up to school age, they will have learned many social skills and will know how to engage with other children and understand how other people feel in different situations. They will also be more able to understand how to act in different settings and situations.
Its important that children have strong social skills so that they are able to make friends and maintain good mental health. Learning good social skills will help your child all the way into their adulthood, however conditions like autism and ADHD can make the development of social skills more difficult.
As your child gets older, having good social skills become more and more important and if they have good social skills during early childhood it is a good sign that they will have an easier time when they become adults. If you think that your child is struggling, there are a few different things you can focus on to help them develop social skills and have an easier time in school.
Politeness
Being able to be polite and understanding to other people are very important as people will not want to be around someone as much if they are not nice to them. The best thing to teach them is when to say “please” and “thank you”, by saying these to your child you’ll leave an impression on them on how to speak to other people. The best thing you can do to help them with politeness is to be a good role model for your children and reward politeness when it is appropriate to do so.
Cooperating
Cooperating is just as important for children as it is for adults. Being able to cooperate in classrooms and on playgrounds can help other children enjoy playing and working with your child. If your child is struggling to cooperate you can help them by creating opportunities around your home to work together on problems and tasks like cleaning up toys or doing the dishes.
Listening
Good listening skills are important in the classroom as well as when you are talking to your friends. Making sure your child is able to listen properly will help them absorb information and understand how other people are feeling. If you need to help them with their listening skills you could ask them to repeat things that have been said to them and remind them that its rude to interrupt.
Following instructions
The ability to follow instructions is important both at school and at home. Not being able to do so could mean that you get into trouble or you could get into danger. This can be a bit more difficult to teach your children because when you are giving them instructions you need to think about if the instructions you are giving are clear and easy to understand. Avoid giving too many instructions at once and avoid phrasing instructions like questions. Say thank you when they have done something that you have told them to do.
Empathy
Being able to understand how another person is feeling is a really important factor when it comes to making friends, especially in childhood. Its tricky to be really good at being empathetic as it can be difficult to be able to understand what other people are feeling and it’s not something to worry about too much if your child doesn’t understand how other people feel right away. Empathy comes with age and time and the more time they spend with other people the better they will be at understanding other people.
Eye contact
Children may avoid eye contact for a number of reasons, it could be because they are shy or uncomfortable around the people or person that they are talking to. They could also be uninterested in what is being said to them or they do not like who is talking to them. However, a long-term issue with eye contact could be a sign of a social disorder and could be misinterpreted by other people as them being rude, so it is really important that you offer help to children who are struggling with eye contact. Like other social skills, positive reinforcement and rewards are good things you can do.
Sharing
Being able to keep friends is often dependent on being able to share. This can include sharing toys or treats and if your child isn’t good at sharing it could lead to difficult friendships. Not having good sharing skills doesn’t automatically mean that they have poor friendship skills, its just a sign that there’s things to work on. If you want to help them, then positive reinforcement is good, you could try and point out good examples of sharing when you see it and offer rewards when your child shares.