Up until now it was thought that making friends was just something children had to learn on their own; playground rules and all that. But new information out of the US suggests that some children experience more difficulty making friends; a situation which has been coined “social dyslexia” and it’s up to us, as parents, to teach these skills to them.
Much like traditional dyslexia, where sufferers have difficulty interpreting numbers and letters on the page in front of them, socially dyslexic children have difficulty reading and interpreting social cues from others, making it tricky for them to meet and retain friends.
Michelle Garcia Winner is a speech pathologist who helped to develop the new way of thinking about kids and their friendships.
She says that the approach works because it acknowledges that not all children enter the world (or school) with the same social skills.
Socially dyslexic children lack the skills that other children have mastered, they then experience difficulty getting along with children in their class, a situation which can be made worse by growing frustration and anxiety.
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Winner says for children who have social dyslexia it can take a lot longer for them to be able to read social cues, which makes it hard for them to join in games and activities with their peers – leaving them isolated and stuck in a cycle of loneliness.
“Considering that 75 per cent of communication is facial expression and body language, stance, volume and tone of voice – and 25 per cent is language – being sluggish at interpreting these cues can leave them at a serious disadvantage,” Winner told stuff.co.uk.