⤎Activity Box

• Yourself.

• Place yourself where the child is most likely to look.
• Give a child a reason to include you. Make yourself FUN to look at and sound FUN to listen to!
• Emphasize interaction (eye contact, closeness, a sense that the child wants to be with you) over every other goal, no matter what you’re doing with a child.

Having fun and being silly is a great activity to promote joint attention in babies. Have fun making silly faces, making funny noises with your mouth and/or wearing funny clothes. All of the above will capture a child’s interest, and attention and they will want to include you in their play. Using funny voices, increase/decrease your voice, and singing will also help capture your little one’s attention. They will want to engage with you, which is important for later social skills with others.

• Mirror.
• Yourself.

• Try holding the baby in front of the mirror.
• They may even reach out to touch the “baby” in the mirror.
• Eventually, they will learn they are seeing their own face and start to recognize their reflection.
• Make faces/touch their noses/hug baby/smile and laugh.
• While looking in the mirror with your baby, you can use this chance to help develop their vocabulary.
• Say the different parts of the face as you point to them on your face and babies.

Babies love faces, and by using a mirror, you can teach them facial expressions. Make happy faces/angry face/silly face. Observe how they react when they are in front of the mirror. Have other people pop in and out of the mirror also. Mirrors are great for building interaction skills, language skills and social skills.

• Outdoor environments.

• If possible, take your child outdoors to other areas of the community.
• This can be to the local park, the local shop or a shopping centre.
• Your child will grow in confidence as they experience new places and see many different faces.
• They will be less frightened of new people and new surroundings if they experience it often.

This activity will help develop their social skills and increase their knowledge of the world around them. Take them out for a stroll and introduce them to neighbours, friends, etc. Show them the sky, flowers, and animals. This way, they will begin to recognize people and things around them. Your child will grow in confidence and actively seek new environments and new people as they get older.

Continue to name and label what they see, who they meet and how they got there e,g, you saw grandad today, and we went on the bus to see him in hospital etc.