Toddler Speech / Language Tip 7 : Eye Contact

You might be wondering - what does eye contact have to do with language?

Well, eye contact actually uses many prelinguistic skills, like awareness of surroundings, and awareness of others in play. This is are crucial skills for overall cognition, and of course for language learning.

One of the best ways to increase eye contact is to bring the attention to the eyes. You can do this by teaching one body part - “eyes.”

Eg. - “Where’s baby’s eyyyyes?” Point toward your child's eyes, maybe very gently and carefully tap to the right of baby’s eyes.

Then - “where’s mommy’s eyes?” And point to your eyes too.

Through this whole exchange, you are “forcing” baby to look at you.

Another way to practice eye contact is to give your child an option between two objects. Bring both objects to your eye level when presenting the choices. Your child will look to your eyes because she is looking at the objects.

For example - if you are playing blocks with baby...

“Should we try another block? Red (bring block to eyes, and then wait for your child to meet your gaze) or green? (bring block to eyes, and then wait for your child to meet your gaze).”

Do these things over and over again, in fun playful ways.

For a printable checklist, more examples, and a tracking sheet / more ideas about ete contact, download the "Toddler Parent Education Handout 7 " on our Teachers Pay Teachers store!

Happy Talking!

Disclaimer : Smarter Speech is a pediatric speech therapy / speech-language pathology practice for toddlers and children providing in-home and teletherapy services in and around Mountain View, CA and Los Gatos, CA. Smarter Speech Blog aims to provide free speech and language tips for parents educators and therapists. However, this post is not providing speech-language pathology services. This is general information, not speech -language pathology or speech therapy. This article does not assume or create a client – SLP relationship. The author is not liable for any losses or damages due to actions or failure to act based on the content in this article. If you need assistance with a child’s speech or language needs, please contact a speech-language pathologist in your area.