NOAH AOC

My OCA1 son Thor will be 3 in September.  Not surprisingly, eye contact and visual engagement during communication is not a regular part of his repertoire, since there's no positive feedback from such with low vision.  I've taught him to wave (rather perfunctorily) on command, but it's not something that occurs to him to do himself, nor of course does he see when others do it (at a typical distance).  And visual mimicry is, again expectedly, pretty nonexistent.

Have parents of toddlers (or older) found it fruitful to try to artificially train at some age their children to more explicitly visually engage (keep a focused look on the face of the person they're talking to, etc)?  If so, when, and how did it go?  I think Thor's too young to bother trying this now, but I'm wondering whether it's something to try to do sooner or later, or if others have had any luck.  Is it something worth trying to teach at age 3-5, or should it come later when social interaction is perhaps easier to conceptualize as a phenomenon/goal for them?

On a perhaps related note, it seems to me that Thor relates to the "other" (other people, except for mommy and daddy) in a more distant fashion than do his peers that I know.  (For example, his peers will often engage me or other peers in communication, but Thor almost never initiates personal engagement with his peers or their parents.)  That seems reasonable to me in light of communication issues such as the above, but I don't know for sure that it's expected or more common with low vision.  (He also reverses his pronouns ("I"/"you"), which may be related, I don't know.)  None of this reaches the level of worrisome clinical diagnosis that I know about - it's just an impression I get.  I'm wondering if it rings a bell with any others in their experience.
 

I too, feel very uncomfortable when  trying to look into someones eyes.  I can kinda do it when I "REALLY" need to but normally I just avoid it.

 Yes, I would highly recommend teaching your son how to socially interact in an acceptable manner.  Children with vision impairments do not learn the visual cues that we 'normally sighted' folks do by observing others. In the US, if you don't look at someone when they are speaking, it is perceived to be a sign of untrustworthiness, lying or otherwise not being engaged / caring about the other person.

When my son was about your son's age, we used many different methods to help him to understand that  even if looking at someone who was talking made no practical sense, he still needed to do it.  We had one game at the dinner table where we would put our face in front of his when he was talking to us - this sometimes meant standing up and or doing other gymnastics to keep our face in front of his.  We all enjoyed this game (it was pretty funny), but in the end he learned that he needed to point his face in the direction of the person who was talking.  Another thing we did when talking one on one with him, was to gently take his face in our hands and point it towards our face. Both of these methods worked really well, and today (now 17 years old), he will look in the direction of the person he is talking to, and try to make eye contact (again, even though it doesn't mean that he can see the person better).

Teaching your son to socially interact in a way that is culturally acceptable is very important. It will help him so much as he gets older and starts to go to school, make friends and so on.  I think one mistake that parents often make is to just accept the way their kids act as a part of the vision impairment. While my son does have some mannerisms and habits that are linked to his vision impairment (for example, he smells people - not obviously, but I know he's doing it as a means of recognizing them, and he also has a habit of violating personal space because he's trying to see them better), for the most part he comes across as 'normal' to his friends. Many of his casual friends don't even realize that he has low vision.

Another thought - you should let him know that it's ok to ask someone who they are if he can't see them. My son will often ask, and explain that he has trouble seeing at a distance.  Most kids are fine with this. He also uses his younger sister to help - and in fact, I encouraged her to help him by telling him who was talking. I also taught him that if someone says "hello" and he can't see who they are, he should smile, and say hello back. All of these things are not necessarily logical (as you mention), but they do help your child become accepted in the sighted world where we use body language and gestures to communicate so much.

I do not think your son is too young to learn these things. 3 year olds are extremely smart and perceptive - my son knew a lot about his own vision and I worked with him on social skills from the time he was 2 (and sometimes have to remind him still!).

Anyway, just some thoughts. . .