Teaching Social Skills to a TWEEN

So my 12 year old is pretty quiet, even around us. His brother does most of the talking and he seems content to let that happen, which is totally fine. He does have a few good friends that he's really close with and he's happy with those friendships and we are too.The thing that has always been a challenge with him is teaching him the necessity of having and utilizing social skills. He tends to be EXTREMELY reliant on others/things to keep him entertained. Meaning he's never been good about playing on his own. He wants someone he's VERY close to (parent, close friend, grandparent) to do something with him, otherwise he resorts to an Ipad or Game That's fine and totally normal to want company, but it's not always possible and we've always encouraged him to find things to keep him occupied (books, games, going outside, etc).The other place it comes into play is with social functions where he's not super familiar with other people. If we got o a family party on my side of the family, he doesn't easily join games or play with other kids. He tends to stand by us and, to be honest, it gets very frustrating because we can't really enjoy ourselves because he is so clearly not enjoying himself. He's even that way around people he's known for a long time, but isn't particularly close. Kids he's gone to school with his whole life, really nice kids. He doesn't understand the importance of just going, making the best of it, and just being a nice friend by asking questions and playing around.Anyways, kind of a long rant but just throwing it out there. I feel like I'm ragging on him all the time (speak up, speak clearly, go interact with some kids), but I feel like he's old enough where he should have these skills. I don't mind that he has only a few friends, but I do mind that his social skills are extremely limited outside of a handful of people. via /r/Parenting https://ift.tt/31NpOFn