Improving Your Child’s Conversation Skills

Conversations are the foundation for building relationships and are the key to social success. The holidays provide lots of opportunities to chat with various people about different topics – food, presents, activities, and general catching up. However, the ability to start and carry on a conversation can be difficult for some, causing a lot of stress and anxiety. Here are a few social communication strategies to teach your kids about how to start and maintain their conversations and increase their conversation skills. 

Conversation Skills Strategies

Having good conversation skills is not only important for social success, but also teaches children how to put thoughts and/or feelings into words, helping them learn to express themselves and solve problems. Becoming a good communicator takes time, and is something we all could continue improving. For kids who struggle with speaking to others, teaching and encouraging good conversation skills through games and activities is a great way to lessen the stress and make learning to chat with others less intimidating. Give these strategies below a try with your child!

The Conversation Stoplight

If you have a large family or chatty group of friends, you know it can be difficult to stop from interrupting and talking over someone, or to indicate that it’s your turn to speak. This skill can be especially difficult for children who struggle with impulse control or have a hard time reading social situations. The Conversation Stoplight is a great way to manage conversation turn-taking and practice social skills, especially during mealtime with family and friends. This conversation strategy not only helps keep interruptions at bay, but helps build active listening skills as well. To start, grab some paper and markers. Draw three circles and cut them out. Have your child can help you with this simple craft by coloring in one circle red, one green, and one yellow. Once you have your colored circles you are good to go! Here’s how conversation stoplight works:

• Red Light: if you have the “red light”, it means that means it’s your turn to listen quietly. When your child has the conversation red light, have them hold up their red circle or place their finger on it to get their body involved to remind them to wait patiently to speak.
• Green Light: if you have the conversation “green light”, it means that your voice is on, and it is your turn to talk. The people listening to you have the conversation red light and will wait until you are done to ask questions and make connected comments.
• Yellow light:  use of the conversation “yellow light” is a great opportunity for our children to get ready to join the conversation. During this time, they can think about a question to ask or relevant comment to make.

Click Here for a great example of a conversation stoplight visual. When everyone sits down for dinner each person can have a red, green, and yellow cutout by their plate to allow for everyone to have a chance to talk and listen effectively.  

Conversation Drivers and Stoppers

Another exercise to help your child’s conversation skills is to teach them about conversation stoppers and drivers. What do these phrases mean exactly? A conversation stopper is exactly what it sounds like it would be – something that stops a conversation, while a driver keeps a conversation going. Stoppers and drivers are more than just comments, they are also behaviors and questions. Teaching our kids good conversation skills goes beyond starting a conversation, but includes teaching about body language and how to react to others when spoken to. Below are some examples of conversation drivers and stoppers. It’s important as parents and caregivers to understand varying thresholds for these skills. Some kids find eye contact difficult to maintain, or will need more time to develop their ability to keep their body engaged in conversation. But explaining these concepts and helping our kids practice is what will lead to success.

• Conversation Driver: behaviors, questions and comments that drive a conversation and keep it going. Some examples include:
  • Maintaining eye contact
  • Use body language to show we’re interested
  • Stay on topic
  • Make connected comments
  • Asking wondering questions
  • Share the conversation
• Conversation Stopper: behaviors that stop a conversation by making it confusing and uncomfortable. Some examples include:
  • Avoiding eye contact or directing eye gaze elsewhere
  • Using body language that shows we’re uninterested (e.g., turning body away from conversation partner)
  • Using a tone of voice that does not sound interested
  • Not responding to questions and comments
  • Changing the topic at the wrong time

Everyday Speech is a social learning platform that teaches the concept of Conversation Drivers and Stoppers to help children determine whether a specific action drove a conversation or stopped it, depending on the reactions of their conversation partner.

Use the above strategies with your children to get some great conversations going! 

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