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Social Skills
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My 8yo ds is, I’m afraid, giving our family that “unsocialized homeschool family” reputation. When an adult speaks to him, he hides behind me or mumbles and won’t make eye contact. When he speaks with other children, at taekwondo for example, he acts extremely silly and never really engages in conversation. My husband and I have both tried working with him on this, explaining that it’s rude not to speak to an adult who addresses you and even having mock conversations so that he can “rehearse” social situations. He is normally a very friendly boy, but for some reason his shy button turns on in the presence of adults or older children. He does fine when having conversations with grandparents, but other adults make him hide and look at the floor. I don’t know why this is, as he’s been around adults his whole life.
Is there anything else we can do to address this issue?
Thanks,
Lindsey
Lindsey, I feel for you – where as I am a very outgoing gregarious type of person, my husband is extremely shy and has avoidant personality disorder which has made a social life for him almost impossible – unfortunately both of my daughters are shy too, but thankfully seem to have missed the avoidant problem. Because of this they have always struggled in social situations, and found friendships very hard to forge. Even when given opportunities they have been uncomfortable and as such have made very few friends over the years. Now they are older, they are better than they were, and have little trouble communicating with adults if they have to, but with people their age it is still a struggle. Some of it stems from the fact that nearly all the people we have met are not homeschooled and are very worldly and my girls are not that way – and the few homeschool groups we have found had much younger children, which they interacted with fine, but none there age. I used to worry myself silly over this, and still do sometimes, because they need friends but I have had to put the worry to bed mostly because they are who they are, and I have to trust that God will help them find their way. Some people are just not outgoing, and some don’t get there until they are older – they are lovely, well mannered quiet girls, and that is that. I have no advice except to say I understand where you are coming from and give it some time. I would not allow him to be rude, which you obviously don’t, but I think we sometimes have to accept some children are quiet and find it hard to open up with people they don’t know. Linda
Lindsey, I think part of it is that he’s a boy and he’s 8. Up until their in their teens it seems that most boys are either painfully quiet or so silly you want to smack them. I’ve worked with Cub Scouts and boys that age for a while. And they are all silly. My husband has expressed concern that our 11-yr-olds are too silly and unsocialized and then I went to an activity with them and about 20 other public-schooled kids and I have to say, mine are doing just fine. Perhaps even better than I thought!
Don’t worry too much about it. He’ll mature and develop. Continue to support him by doing the mock conversations and such. Help him find situations where he can interact with other kids and adults. Park days. Sports. Scouts. Church. My boys have really shined when we take them to the zoo or nature/science centers (they’re big science nerds). During the day when it’s pretty empty the employees are dying to do something so they often take the boys behind the scenes and show them stuff you wouldn’t normally see. The boys converse easily and intelligently with adults they’ve never met! The first few times blew my mind. Take your little guy places where he has an interest and see if you can find a lonely worker to talk with him. A lot of pet stores will do this too.
For kids his own age or a bit older, again, I think it’s a time thing. But also helping him find common ground might be necessary. My kids had a hard time with the neighborhood kids at the park because they were all into Beyblade and my boys had never heard of it. So, we watched some episodes on Netflix (twaddle!) and bought them a few toys so they could ‘battle’ and all the sudden they were playing and talking with everyone. Huge groups of boys on our back porch, chatting up a storm. Don’t embrace those worldly things that are against your morals, but if possible, find something that will help him strike up conversations.
Hang in there.
Heather
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