15 Interesting Social Skills Activities For Kids

What do you do if you want to develop positive social skills for kids? Playing and going out with friends and family would probably be the most popular answer. If you were one of the people who agreed with the answer, you aren’t entirely correct, but you aren’t entirely wrong either! Just like adults, kids also need a set of people who can understand their social needs and give them the kind of interaction and communication they want.

While a large part of peer interaction and social development is intuitive, social activities and exercise can go a long way in developing a greater understanding of the society within kids. Here are a few social skill activities for kids of all ages that will help improve long-term social skills.

Social Skills Activities For Kindergarten:

Your child needs appropriate guidance about good communication and behavior. It’s an excellent way to introduce social games for kids and concepts at varying developmental stages for your kindergarten and preschoolers.

1. Eye On The Forehead:

You Will Need:

• Eye stickers.

How To:

1. Divide the kids into pairs.

2. Now place an eye or eyes sticker on one teammate’s forehead.

3. Encourage the other child to look at the sticker.

4. The round will end if the player blinks.

5. Swap the team-mates and repeat the game.

6. The game will train your kindergarten to look in the correct direction, in a less intimidating way. This is one of the fun social skills activities for kids.

[ Read: Team Building Activities For Kids ]

2. Build The Vocab:

You Will Need:

• A few objects like a kitchen tool, a toy or a stationary

How To:

1. Hand your child an object and tell him to describe what he thinks about it, according to his perspective. She has to make the object look like something it isn’t. For him, an empty cup can be a duck’s bill or a party hat.

2. This social skill training for children will develop their vocabulary and story-building skills.

3. Setting The Table:

You Will Need:

• Markers
• Scissors
• Double-sided tape.
• Construction paper in 7 different colors.

How To:

1. Lay out the table for your little toddler to observe and learn.

2. Now have your kid draw and cut out the following from the construction paper.

• Dinner fork
• Salad fork
• Soupspoon
• Teaspoon
• Knife
• Plate
• Water glass
• Napkin

4. Mimic Me:

You Will Need:

• Nothing

How To:

1. This activity requires kids to mimic you.

2. If you touch your forehead, tell him to do the same.

3. If you pinch your nose, tell him to follow.

4. Box your ears lightly and tell him to do the same.

5. The activity will help the kids pick up the expression and read them appropriately.

   [ Read: Conversation Activities For Kids ]

5. Space Invader:

You Will Need:

• Popsicle sticks
• Pictures of cartoon aliens.
• Crayons
• Glue

How To:

1. Tell your child to the color the images of the cartoon aliens. Now help him cut it out.

2. Stick the alien’s pictures to the popsicle sticks. As you affix the images, explain to your kid why respecting another person’s space is important. You can also introduce him to the concepts of using ‘gentle hands’ to get someone’s attention instead of hitting or shouting.

3. Further, explain to him that the aliens he has colored are you, and he is space, the invader.

4. When the child puts up his mark of the space invader, the aliens would require a moment to regroup. Make him do the same.

5. This way, you can explain to him the concept of giving people their space to play.

6. One Question Interview:

You Will Need:

• Cards
• Pen

How To:

1. Write simple questions on the cards like “What’s your favorite food?” or “Do you have a pet”?

2. Have the kids sit in a circle. Now pass out the cards and tell each of them to read out the question.

3. Tell the kids to disperse in another room and get into pairs within five minutes.

4. Now tell the kids to ask each other the questions and listen to the answers.

5. Now ask every kid individually what they learned about the partner.

6. The activity will encourage active listening and will let the kids know about each other.

7. Telephone Skills:

You Will Need:

• Round number stickers.
• Card stock paper
• Small sticky notes.
• Scissors

How To:

1. Tell your child to make a telephone model of the card stock paper. Cut a rectangular shape from the card stock and replicate the phone’s keys by sticking the round number stickers.

2. Now give your and your partner’s number to your kid and tell him to practice calling and dialling. You can teach him about emergency numbers too.

3. Now talk to your kid from your phone when he dials your number from his phone. Carry out the conversation just like you would do with any other adult. This way, you can teach your kid about communication skills and ways of interacting with others on the phone.

   [ Read: Interesting Activities For Kid ]

Social Activities For Young Children

Teaching social skills activities is important for the growth of your child. Here are few such helpful activities for your young and middle school aged children.

8. Emotion Charade:

You Will Need:

• Paper
• Pen
• Bowl

How To:

1. Write down some words related to feelings on small slips of paper. Put all the paper slips in a bowl and shuffle.

2. Now have the kids take turns at picking out a paper and acting out the feeling written on it. You can also allow the kids to draw the emotion on a black or white board. The other kids have to guess what emotion the player is trying to demonstrate.

3. Instruct the kids clearly that they cannot talk. Neither can they draw the emotion using a face. They have to express it by drawing the situation and body language that can lead to the feeling. This game is one of the excellent social skills group activities for kids.

9. Improvisational Storytelling:

Social skills may be delayed in some children, especially those with special needs. This is one such social skills activities for autism.

You Will Need:

• Pictures of emotions.

How To:

1. Place the images of the emotions face down on the surface.

2. Now tell the players to think about elements that must appear in the story. It can be anything, from a dog to a banana to a lemur.

3. Tell the first player to pick a card and start his narration. He is free to take the story in any direction he likes. But the catch is that he must incorporate the emotion on his card.

4. After he has finished, have another child take his turn at picking a card and making up the story. Kids have to build on each other’s idea, making use of all the story elements.

10. Swinging:

You Will Need:

• Nothing

How To:

1. Take your child to the nearby community park for swinging.

2. Make an eye contact with him as he swings back and forth.

3. Also, tell him to try to reach for you with his right foot if you are standing on his right and left foot if you are standing on his left.

4. The activity will help him direct his focus to you and will calm him down.
5. Kids love to swing and so this can be one of the favourite social activities for children.

[ Read: Educational Activities For Kids ]

11. Freeze It:

This is one such best social skills activities for high school students and teens to improve their team building skills.

You Will Need:

• Nothing

How To:

1. Assemble the kids in the hall room or garden.

2. Choose an ‘it’ and ask the other children to line up horizontally.

3. Now ask the kids to freeze like statues. The ‘it’ now has to try to make the other players laugh.

4. The first kid to laugh will be the ‘it’ for the next round.

5. The game will teach kids self-control and patience, few of essential social skills.

12. Manners And More:

Social skills activities for middle school students help their personal growth and development. This is one such social development activities for children that can help them to understand about the social skills and thereby develop them.

You Will Need:

• Construction paper.
• Magazine
• Glue
• Scissors
• Markers
• Colors

How To:

1. First, talk to your kids about good and bad manners. Tell him that there’s only a thin line between good manners and bad manners. For example, greeting an elder while sitting versus greeting him cordially while standing up.

2. Now tell him to make a collage on good and bad manners with the magazine cut out.

3. You can even ask them to make a slogan on the manners.

13. Word Strips:

You Will Need:

• Paper
• Pen
• Double-sided tape.

How To:

1. Draw and cut the words like ‘peace’, ‘clean’, ‘silence’, ‘neat’ and ‘hygiene’.

2. Now talk to him about the relevant rules like ‘maintaining silence in the library’, staying quiet when someone is on the call,’ ‘keeping the wardrobe clean’ and so on.

3. Now cut out the strips and tell your child to stick when he think it’s appropriate.

14. Who Has The Peanut?

You Will Need:

• 1 peanut in the shell

How To:

1. The purpose of the game is the find out who has the peanut.

2. Have the kids sit in a circle, placing their hands behind their back and closing it tightly.

3. Now select one kid to be the ‘peanut passer’. Holding the peanut in his hand, tell him to go around the circle, sliding his hands through the other kid’s hand until he secretly passes off the peanut. He has to go through the circle one full time before giving the peanut.

4. As the passer walk around, the other kids have to chant ‘Mr. Peanut where are you? Mr. Peanut come to me.”

5. Now select a kid and ask him who he thinks has the peanut. Keep asking until you find the actual location of the peanut.

6. When you’ve found the peanut, the kids have to chant, “we’ve found the peanut! Pass the peanut, but not to me”!

7. Repeat the game with another peanut passer.

   [ Read: Outdoor Activities For Kids ]

15. Name Game:

You Will Need:

• A ball

How To:

1. Make the kids sit in a circle and give one of them a ball.

2. Now ask the child with the ball to name a fellow player and roll the ball to him.

3. The recipient has to do the same thing.

4. The process will repeat itself through the game.

There are many other ways to instill social values and develop social skills in kids. These are just a few examples. Do you have any more social interaction games for children that can help them improve their social skills? If you said yes, then please leave a comment below.

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