Joint Attention Part Two: Looking and Learning in the Real World

If you missed the first post about the importance of joint attention, you can read it here.

Let's look at what joint attention looks like in the real world.  First notice when your child is involved in joint attention with you.  Although it begins to develop early on as an infant, joint attention is a great language tool for many years. In fact, think about communication--we are focused on the same thing together --ideally jointly attending to a subject! Considering children, joint attention may be especially effective when child initiated since that is where interest lies.  When your child sees an object and wants you to join in his gaze by looking at you and the object, by pointing, gesturing or vocalizing, respond accordingly!  Talk about it!  Try using simple language such as
"Horse! You see the horse! It's a little horse, isn't it?"

By trying to speak in a natural voice, and over time with these experiences, your child can learn language.  If you notice that your child is watching your gaze to see what you see, again, talk about it in a simple natural way.  When looking at books, respond to what your child is most interested in and don't feel it is necessary to read all the words of a book to your toddler.  Simplifying text based on age level is definitely appropriate.  Babies and toddlers often enjoy and can respond to one word labels in books and pictures. Finally, when engaging in the repetitive routines of life, talk about what you are doing.  Your child is most likely paying attention to what you are doing when you are bathing her, dressing her, or feeding her and becomes accustomed to these daily tasks. Talk about these things in simple natural language, using similar language each time, perhaps using melody to make it playful, or even making it into a song.   When swinging for example you can sing "swing, swing, swing!"  The natural game of grabbing toes as your child comes back to you in the swing and saying, "Got your toes! Got your toes!" is a great repetitive and social language game.

If your child hears these verbal routines over and over and often enough, they can absorb more language, understand more, and become ready to say more as well!