5 Tips to boost your preschool-aged child’s social development: Tip #1

In the last blog post, I talked about how with the COVID-19 pandemic, mental health professionals are seeing a rise in social-emotional difficulties in our youngest children. Teachers are saying that their kindergarteners are presenting like preschool students and first graders are presenting as kindergarteners…

It’s not a surprise, given that a lot or most of what these children can remember are social distancing, quarantining, and virtual learning. They have not had as many opportunities to practice social skills, be in public settings, and try new things compared to children who were born before the pandemic.

In previous posts, I discussed how to differentiate between typical social development in COVID-19 times and when is there cause for concern. The top 3 warning signs of atypical social development are: 1) Difficulty sustaining interactions with peers they are familiar with (link to old blog post), 2) Anxiety that is negatively impacting daily life activities or social interactions (link to old post) and 3) Big differences in how well your child interacts with peers versus adults (link to old post).

Whether or not your child is showing signs of atypical development, there are a few suggestions that I find are helpful in many young children having social difficulties. Here is Tip# 1: Get to the social event early

For anxious children or children who a little socially awkward, I always recommend to parents to get the social event 5 to 10 minutes early. It could be a birthday party, a gymnastics class, preschool potluck, same rules apply.

There are two reasons why I recommend this. First of all being if you give yourself more time and are less rushed, you will be more relaxed and less stressed and thus your kid will be less stressed. Young kids definitely pick up on the energy and mood of their caregivers and it affects them.

Secondly, it gives the child a chance to warm and get used to the new environment and people, when it is quieter and there are less people. I’ve heard from numerous parents, that their child ends up doing much better at events when they simply bring them a few minutes early versus on time or late. Setting the right mood or tone at the start of a social event can really impact the whole outcome of the event and how the child does.

Today, I’ll be sharing Tip No. 2: Prep your child in advance

For new social situations, be it camp, a new school or a new extracurriculars, prep your children as much as possible. Find out what the schedule will be like and if possible, visit the location in advance. If visiting the location in advance is not possible, then see if you can find a few pictures of the location online, look at them together with your child, and talk about what the class/camp/school will be like. This is also a good time to talk about any feelings your child might have about the new situation and any concerns.

At all ages, but particularly in early childhood emotional development and social development go hand in hand. In this blog post I’ll share ideas about how to develop your kid’s emotional awareness and why emotional awareness is key for social skills at this age. Our Tip No. 3 is working with your child on identifying their own feelings.

Emotions, either uncomfortable or comfortable ones, we all have them, and these emotions affect our thought process. Our thought process then affects our actions and how we interact with others. With preschool aged children these can often be big emotions, so big that sometimes they struggle about what to do with these big feelings and how express them appropriately.

If we think about the skill of emotion regulation (the ability to feel emotions and react them in an adaptive way), the first step is recognizing emotions.

Being able to put a name to feelings can be very beneficial for little ones. They are learning to be aware of different feelings. They can communicate with adults and peers effectively about what they are experiencing. And by having a name for what they are feeling, children can start to recognize what leads to or “triggers” that feeling.

The goal eventually is to be able to identify and recognize other’s feelings too, but first children need to be able to identify their own feelings and know them like they know the palm of their hand. So how do you develop emotional awareness in little ones? There are lots of ways.

I’m a big fan of bibliotherapy, which is using books and literature along with traditional therapy techniques to foster mental health. Ask your kids to show you what does your face look like when you feel ____ feeling? What does your body look like when you feel ____ feeling?

Sometimes bringing out a mirror and having your child look into it can be eye opening. They might not realize what they look like when they are proud, angry, or jealous. Some of my favorite books for this age group are The Way I Feel by Janan Cain as well as Glad Monster, Sad Monster by Ed Emberley and Anne Miranda.

Another strategy is using feeling charts. You can get one with your child’s interests. They have all kinds these days, unicorn feelings, dinosaur feelings, emoji feelings, ninja feelings… Talk about what each of these feelings mean. Then make it a daily routine to have each family member go around the table and identify how they are feeling at the moment.

If you feel like your young child may need more support beyond general parenting tips and behavioral strategies, we are running a social skills group for kids ages 3 to 5. In the social skills group, children will be given individualized support on how to navigate social situations with peers and manage big emotions.

About the Author:

Jennifer Yang, Ed.S. NCSP is a Nationally Certified School Psychologist with 12 years of experience in the mental health field. She worked with Fairfax County Public Schools (FCPS) as a clinician in a Comprehensive Services Site (CSS) for special education students with severe social and emotional challenges as well as a Behaviorist in public schools in New Jersey. She also brings to her work her personal experiences of being a Mom to a neurodiverse child with ADHD. Jennifer is currently working under the supervision of Christine Willing, M.Ed., Licensed School Psychologist, to obtain her licensure in private practice as she is transitioning from working in schools to private practice.

This article is for education. It does not replace care from a licensed clinician.