girl looking at mobile phone

At a time when we are all inside socially isolating ourselves, it is more important than ever that we are keeping social with others. This could mean either through social media or physically. As adults we will miss the social interaction we have everyday with co-workers, in the supermarket, talking to friends and people who don’t live with us. For our children they will miss playing in the playground, running around laughing with friends or just chatting about random stuff. Most of us need face to face social interaction to survive and will miss the hugs from friends. So what can we do about it? How do we help our children connect and continue to enjoy their friendships when they can’t see each other?

Keeping Social During Isolation

They can connect online and thankfully we have facetime, Instagram, snapchat, twitter, MSN, text, whatsapp, facebook, skype and house party, among many others.  Get your child up and running on any of these so that they can ‘see their friends’ or just engage with them through written text. Also encourage them to connect with friends outside of school, grandparents, aunties, uncles etc,. so they have a variety of different types of conversation and interaction. I know many children are now playing online games with grandparents and having virtual games evenings over house party. People are having to get more creative to stay connected.

Over the course of the coming weeks and months your child’s friends are going to be important. They will need to be able to vent about how their family is driving them mad (probably more than once), they will need to talk about their feelings and worries about this virus and they may need help with their homework (don’t let them suffer in silence). They need to still laugh and have fun and both of those will help in these uncertain times.

I’d love to hear how you are keeping social during isolation. Leave a comment or post on my social accounts. Wishing you all well in these uncertain times.