![]() For example, “thank you for looking at me, that’s great!”Īnd, if the child is asking for something, the parent or caregiver should demand (nicely of course!) that they do while looking at them in the eye. ![]() When kids learn to look in the eyes of someone they are trying to communicate with, they should be given positive reinforcement. The parents themselves need to be role models, and look their children in the face when conversing with them too. (where we learned the story of the mom mentioned above), agrees with this stance, and mentions that parents should work on the skill of eye contact with their children in a daily way. The solution, according to the article noted above, is that children should be pushed to use eye contact at the same time they are learning their please and thank-yous. So learning how to do it at a young age is beneficial to later years. ![]() Making eye contact as a baby is crucial for development – mostly because they can’t see that far, and they need facial expressions to understand new things, and relationships.Įye contact is also a very important non-verbal communication language at any age, not just in young children. Teach eye contact in conjunction with social skills in toddlers and young childrenĪccording to, many children must learn how to be polite, but they don’t always learn to make eye contact. When you find out what is preventing them from wanting to make eye contact when someone speaks to them, you can more easily help the situation. Is it because they are culturally conditioned to not make eye contact, as a sign of reverence to elders? Or is it because they are bothered by other things in the room? Be sensitive to your child’s feelings and thoughts – which they may not express in words. Before you delve into the activities for improving eye contact, it’s best to find the root cause of the issue. Find out why your child doesn’t make eye contact, and work backwards from thereĪccording to, a child who doesn’t make eye contact could be avoiding the social skill for multiple reasons. Keep note that a child not making eye contact is not the only indicator of Autism! However, it is telling that the social skill is important in a child’s development.īelow we’ll give some ideas, gathered from around the web, on how to teach eye contact as a social skill in young children. We’ve written about recognizing Autism on our blog here. We also know that lack of eye contact, or a lack of interest in eye contact is a sign of Autism. This was the discovery of one mom, who shared her story online, and learned that eye contact was probably making her daughter a less desired kid to hang out with. But as they grow older, parents find that the importance of eye contact in young children is crucial, and they need to teach it as a social skill. When they’re really young, we expect that of them. They can hide their faces, or try not to look at a person who is speaking to them – whether or not they are the same age.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |