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Joint attention means both of you are sharing your attention toward some other interesting thing. You know you're sharing attention when you each are checking in with each other’s face.

Your child will follow your point or your eye gaze to see what you are paying attention to. They will know it’s interesting by your tone of voice and facial expression.

Don’t think of this as a following-directions type of activity. Make sure your child learns that we share joint attention because it’s interesting and fun. Joint attention is a foundation of communication. We communicate because we want to share experiences with someone, not so we can follow commands.

Today’s activity: Model and encourage joint attention by pointing with animation, looking between the object and your child’s face. Be sure to wait for your child to have time to notice and look. Make an object more interesting by touching or moving the object.

Visit www.TheInteractionCoach.com to see the directory of speech-language pathologists licensed in your area. If you can’t find one in the directory, contact me at [email protected] and I’ll track down someone for you.

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