“She may benefit from some pragmatics language training.” The suggestion seemed so casual and minor that until I began to explore just want pragmatics is, it sounded simple. But problems with pragmatics are anything but simple.

Pragmatic language refers to language used in social context. There are basically three components to pragmatic language:

--using language for various purposes – such as the difference between greeting, informing, or requesting.
-- knowing how to adapt your language to meet the needs/expectations of the listener. This includes giving listeners enough background information or talking differently to babies and young children than to adults.
-- following the rules for conversation, which includes turn-taking, introducing new topics, telling a story, rephrasing when misunderstood. Reading and giving non-verbal communication is a part of this as well.

Children who have difficulty taking turns in a conversation, difficulty with volume control of their voice, difficulty with understanding analogies and idioms, difficulty “reading” body language – those are pragmatic language difficulties.

Children with autism spectrum disorders often have pragmatic language difficulties, sometimes called “social skills” problems. But so do children with ADHD and executive functioning disorder. These children have real problems being flexible and not impulsive in their responses to conversation and social situations.

Children with anxiety disorders and those who have been traumatized also have problems with pragmatic language, because of their tendency to misread the non-verbal cues as negative or threatening and once the anxiety is triggered, their ability to navigate the social situation is extremely diminished.

Getting myself up to speed on pragmatics, I learned there is much a parent can do to help a child “practice” -- much of which I was almost instinctively doing. Here are some ideas:

1. use daily events as a chance to practice and break each social event down into steps. Teach your child how to greet and say goodbye, and practice throughout the day. Catch the child doing something correct socially and praise him.
2. role play with your child. Practice a new situation, such as meeting your new teacher, starting a conversation with another child, or asking for help from a salesclerk.
3. help your child to learn to tell stories. Often being able to relate stories about past events is a real problem for children with pragmatic language problems. Short-term memory issues come into play. Sometimes using visual cues or pictures helps the child to be able to sequence the story and then to communicate it.
4. find social skills groups to enable your child to practice. Speech therapists often lead social skills groups that enable children who need intervention to practice in a facilitated setting. A skill is presented and the children get a chance to practice the skill.
5. find less “formal” social skills groups or facilitate opportunities in the community by getting your child involved in scouts, church or other social activities. Facilitate as much as necessary.