Introduction to Teaching Social Skills

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Introduction to Teaching Social Skills

• Presented by
• Candace A. Fugazy MA.Edu, BCBA
• Megan Mayo, BA
• 8/20/10

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Why is Social Development so Important?

• Research states that People with friends are .
• Happier/fewer instances of mental health
  disorders (e.g., depression)
• Healthier/Live Longer
• Less likely to be victims of crime (or bullying)
• Overall positive outcomes

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Why is Social Development so Important? (Cont.)

• Social relations act as a natural support
  function.
• - Help us accomplish goals and tasks.
• - Helps gain entry into social
  groups/more friends more support.
• Can aid in the stimulation of language
  development/more natural language.
• Interaction with peers allows children to acquire
  and practice learned skills.
• - modeling
• - feedback

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Why is Social Development so
Important? (Cont.)

• Establishes a feeling of behavioral competency,
  support and belonging.
• It is not necessary to be social all of the time
  but skills are needed to draw people to you. If
  kids are un-responsive, peers will be
  un-responsive too.
• Best prediction of positive, long term outcomes
  for people with special needs.

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Diagnostic Criteria for Autism Spectrum Disorder
Three Major Areas of Impairment

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Theory of Mind (ToM) and Perspective Taking

• The ability to intuitively track what others know
  and think during personal interactions.
• The ability to imagine what someone else might be
  thinking and to know that it those thoughts are
  different from your own.

• Deficits in ToM are also referred to as
  mind-blindness.
• Can look like selfishness or a lack of empathy
• ToM difficulties affects comprehension of
  literature as well as social interactions.

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Aspergers Syndrome

• Impairment in social interactions theory of
  mind, difficulty developing age appropriate peer
  interactions.
• Lack of social/emotional reciprocity.
• No clinically significant delays in language,
  cognitive development, self care skills, and
  adaptive behavior.
• Significant delays in social, occupational, or
  other important areas of functioning.
• May seem oblivious toward the perspective of
  others.
• May seem one sided or egocentric.

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Aspergers Syndrome

• Literal thinkers
• Difficulty comprehending the idea of
  friendships
• Interests often comprise of very rote facts.
• May crave social interaction on their own terms
  but may lack emotional connection with others.
• May have very flat speech.
• May be clumsy and have poor handwriting or
  drawing skills.
• Inflexible to social rules-Hidden Curriculum
  makes teaching social rules difficult.

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Social Deficits in Individuals with Emotional
Behavioral Disorder

• Excess of the following behaviors
• Arguing/ Tantruming
• Defiant Behavior and/or Aggressive Behavior
• Non-Compliance (most students comply with
  teachers requests 80 of the time, Tough Kids
  only 40)
• Coercive behavior to get their way with peers
  and adults.
• Lack of self-management skills

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Social Deficits in Individuals with Emotional
Behavioral Disorder

• Academic deficits
• Lack of social foundation skills (e.g.,
  initiating conversation, grooming, cooperation,
  and offering positive feedback to others.)
• Lack of Intermediate/Advanced Social
  Skills-skills building on foundation skills
  (e.g., accepting negative feedback,
  assertiveness, saying No, resisting peer
  pressure and teasing, and anger management.)
• Students may be socially immature, controlling,
  withdrawn and non-cooperative.

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Social Deficits in Individuals with Emotional
Behavioral Disorder

• Rapid turnover in friendships. Tend to have
  friendships with younger peers or of similar
  behavioral difficulty.
• Students who often act out and are non-compliant
  and disruptive during their school years often
  carry these same behaviors into adulthood.
• Generally speaking grow up to have multiple
  marriages, difficulty holding jobs, and break
  societys laws.

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Learning Disabled Students-Evans, Axelrod and
Sapia, 2000, cited from Karvale, KA and Forness,
SR, 1996.

• 75 of students with learning disabilities
  possess poor social interactions and
  inappropriate behaviors in comparison to their
  peers.
• Exhibit fewer positive social behaviors.
• Showed less initiative in peer interactions.
• Lower rates of peer reinforcement and possessed
  less cooperative behaviors.

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Learning Disabled Students-Evans, Axelrod and
Sapia, 2000, cited from Green, RW et al., 1996.

• Research demonstrates a significant relationship
  between social impairment and the likelihood of
  tobacco, alcohol or other drug abuse. This
  suggests that social impairment plays a pivotal
  role in increasing the likelihood of children
  abusing substances as they progress through
  adolescence.

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Why Dont All Children Learn Acceptable Social
Behaviors?

• May not possess the cognitive ability
• May not know what the appropriate behaviors are.
• The students emotional responses may inhibit the
  performance of the desired behavior (e.g.,
  anxiety, fear or anger).
• May have the knowledge but lack the practice.

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Considerations in Interventions

• What skill to target? Examples?
• What are the benefits of having this skill?
• Does it use their strengths?
• Will it motivate the child?
• Where can it be used?
• How does the child learn best?
• How to make it meaningful?
• How is the skill going to generalize?

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Basic Steps to Intervention- Axelrod and Sapia,
2000

• Identify key skills
• -e.g., look for skills that might lead to
  punishing results and target them first. Skills
  that lead to peer acceptance.
• Target only a few new skills at a time.
• Teach skill in isolation.
• Practice in controlled settings.
• Prompt/Assess in Uncontrolled settings
• Work with educators and parents to know when to
  ignore, praise and focus attention on certain
  behaviors to improve pro-social behaviors and
  increase success.

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Some Social Skill Interventions

• Social Thinking Curriculum/Superflex
• Peer Intervention
• Social Stories
• Comic Strip Conversations
• Video Modeling
• Contingency Mapping

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What is Social Thinking?

• A instruction-based approach to supporting social
  behavior.
• Explicitly teaches
• social rules and norms,
• emotional regulation strategies
• perspective taking
• causes and effects of behavior of self and others
• Developed by Michelle Garcia Winner, SLP.

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Who is Social Thinking for?

• Aspergers Syndrome
• High Functioning Autism
• PDD-NOS
• Nonverbal Learning Disability
• ADHD
• Anyone with social cognitive deficits

• High IQ, and other standardized test scores do
  not rule out weak social cognition.
• Anyone with 1) strange behavior, 2) lack of a
  peer group, or 3) poor school performance
  compared to what would be predicted based on test
  scores probably has difficulties with social
  cognition.

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In what ways may individuals have difficulties
with Social Thinking?

• Central Coherence Theory
• Executive Functioning
• Theory of Mind
• Wetherby, A.M Prizant, B.M. (2001). Autism
  Spectrum Disorders A Transactional Developmental
  Perspective. Baltimore,MD, Paul Brookes
  Publishing.

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Central Coherence Theory

• The ability to incorporate smaller ideas into a
  larger concept.
• Relating parts into a larger pattern of behavior
  and thought.

• Deficits in Central Coherence Theory might look
  like
• Conceptual learning disability
• Difficulties understanding the big picture
• Difficulty making connections between common
  events
• Difficulties generalizing learning to new
  situations.

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Executive Functioning (EF)

• Identifying a problem, identifying a solution,
  locating resources, making a plan, executing that
  plan.
• In more technical terms,EF refers to the
  neurological processes that are behaviorally
  manifested as
• initiating behaviors while inhibiting other
  behaviors that may interfere with problem solving
• Regulating attention to filter out distraction
  and irrelevant information and shifting attention
  to the relevant information
• Upload and manipulate mental representations of
  the plan/behaviors
• It is action selection and initiation- the
  integration of memory, perception, affective, and
  motivation systems.
• Pennington Ozonoff (1996). Executive Functions
  and Developmental Psychopathology. Journal of
  Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied
  Disciplines, 37, 51-87

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I-LAUGH Model

• I Initiation of Communication or Action
• LListening With Eyes and Brain
• AAbstract and Inferential
• UUnderstanding Perspective
• GGestalt Processing Getting the Big Picture
• HHumor and Human Relatedness

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I
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L
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A
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U
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G
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H
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Some Social Thinking Terminology

• Expected and unexpected behaviors
• Following the rules (written and unwritten) is
  expected behavior. Behavior that doesnt make
  social norms or rules is unexpected
• Good thoughts and weird thoughts
• People have good thoughts about people when
  they have expected behaviors. People have
  weird thoughts about people who have
  unexpected behaviors
• Smart guess and wacky guess
• A smart guess is an educated guess based on
  evidence and information. A wacky guess is one
  made when one doesnt have enough or any
  information.

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Tools for teaching social thinking

• Behavior Maps
• Maps out an event
• Identifies the problem
• How the student tried to solve it
• How well the solution worked
• What effects the behavior had on others
• What other solutions might there be that are both
  self smart and people smart

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Problem There is a field trip to the Great
Escape and I have to ride the bus. I hate the bus.
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Tools for teaching social thinking

• Behavior Maps
• Maps out a topic/scenario
• Lists the expected and unexpected behaviors in a
  situation
• How those behaviors make others feel
• The consequences of the effects of the behaviors
• How those consequences feel
• Helps individuals see the chain of events for the
  choices they make

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Riding on a School Bus
Adapted from Winner, M.G.(2007). Social Behavior
Mapping. Connecting Behavior, Emotions, and
Consequences Across the Day. San Jose, CA
Michelle Garcia Winner.
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Riding on a School Bus
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Tools for teaching social thinking

• 5 Point Scales
• Systems for visually representing more complex or
  abstract things, such as emotions, anxiety, and
  social acceptability.
• How is Your Engine Running?
• The Incredible 5 Point Scale
• A 5 is Out of Control
• A 5 is Against the Law
• Can help students think about all the shades of
  grey between black and white thinking.

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Bens Angry/Pissed off Scale
From Buron, K.D. Curtis, M. (2003) The
Incredible 5-Point Scale. Shawnee Mission, KS
Autism Asperger Publishing Co.
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Tools for teaching social thinking

• Superflex/Be a Social Detective
• By Michelle Garcia Winner
• A story based curriculum for school age children
  with social learning delays to learn to
• Think about other peoples behavior (be an OWL.
  Observe, wonder, learn)
• Learn what behaviors are expected and
  unexpected
• Learn about good thoughts and uncomfortable
  thoughts that people can have about other
  peoples behavior
• Superflex includes a cast of bad guys who
  represent common roadblock to effective social
  communication.

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Peer Intervention-NSR Established Treatment

• Typically developing children are selected and
  trained to improve social interaction of children
  with autism.
• May work with students one on one or in small
  groups in natural settings.
• Peers may be better at redirecting children with
  autism as they are more natural role models and
  may be better accepted than adults.

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Peer Intervention

• The primary objective of including peers as
  intervention agents is to increase social
  participation in naturalistic settings without
  allowing the children to isolate themselves or
  rely on teachers for prompting.
• -Strain and Kohler, 1998.
• Social and play skills are often the most
  challenging deficits in children with autism and
  seldom addressed in school based classrooms.

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Peer Intervention

• Peers should be carefully chosen.
• (Phil Strain)- The potential peer should
• Possess appropriate self care skills
• Have the ability to move through activities
  without direction
• Possess on-task behavior minimum 90 of the time
• Be older for cross developmental training.
• Have a wide friendship network (they may already
  have the skills to interact with a variety of
  personalities).
• Exceptions

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Interaction Concepts

• Teach the peer..
• how to gain attention from the child.
• how to keep speech brief.
• how to give directions and demonstrate skills to
  the child.
• how to administer reinforcement.
• how to re-direct.
• the skills to handle rejection.
• - rehearse/roll play with the peer
• - drill the notion that if you are not
  successful to try again

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More Interaction Concepts

• Use gestural and visual prompts to avoid adult
  dependence
• Allow children to be 11. Be the ring leader
  and organizer, not the translator
• Use Shadow Prompting
• - stand behind the child and whisper the
  question/comment in the childs ear
• - helpful intervention for echolalia with
  hopes that responses will generalize
• - only whisper the words you want the child to
  speak

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Typical Steps of InteractionAdapted from
Simpson et. al (1997). SocialSkills for Students
with Autism-2nd Edition

• 1. Peer establishes eye contact (e.g. say
  students name, touch shoulder, etc.).
• 2. Peer establishes a joint focus of attention
  (e.g. look at same toy).
• 3. Peer describes his or her own play and that
  of others.
• 4. Peer prompts requests (e.g. Do you want the
  car? Say yes.).
• 5. Acknowledges all forms of communication.
• 6. Expands and restate comments.
• 7. Requests clarification as needed.
• 8. Redirects play activity as needed.

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Typical Steps of InteractionAdapted from
Simpson et. al (1997). SocialSkills for Students
with Autism-2nd Edition

• Tips on Using
• Teach peers to acknowledge and discuss the
  behaviors of student with autism to help increase
  awareness and understanding.
• Encourage brief interaction initially and
  gradually expand.
• Initially focus on activity rather than on the
  interaction to allow children to become familiar
  with one another.
• Emphasize similarities among all students.
• Teach peers how to obtain answers (e.g. using
  communication choice boards).
• Teach socially competent peers to interact with
  student with autism and incorporate untrained
  peers into the activity.
• Emphasize turn taking behaviors.

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Benefits for Typical Peer

• They develop more positive and accepting
  attitudes towards individuals with disabilities.
• Develop stronger social skills.
• Equal, if not greater developmental progress.
• Have less disruptive/inappropriate behavior.
• Viewed as more socially skillful by teachers and
  parents.

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Social Stories-NSR Established Treatment

• Developed by Carol Gray in 1991.
• Assists students in learning the perspectives of
  the individuals they are interacting with and
  developing a greater social understanding.
• A short description of a particular event or
  activity offering specific information on what to
  expect and why.
• Offers students skills for reaction and/or
  interaction in varied social situations.

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Social Stories

• To develop self-care skills (e.g. how to clean
  teeth, wash hands or get dressed), social skills
  (e.g. sharing, asking for help, saying thank you,
  interrupting), sexuality, etc.
• To assist an individual to cope with changes to
  routine, and unexpected or distressing events
  (e.g. absence of teacher, moving house,
  thunderstorms).
• To provide positive feedback to an individual
  regarding an area of strength or achievement in
  order to develop self esteem.
• As a behavioral strategy (e.g. what to do when
  angry, how to cope with obsessions).

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How Are Social Stories Helpful to Individuals
With ASD?

• Information is presented in a literal, concrete
  and accurate manner, which may aide in the
  individuals understanding of a previously
  difficult or ambiguous situation or activity.
• The visual presentation of Social Stories
  utilizes the preference for visual processing
  experienced by many individuals with ASD.

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How Are Social Stories Helpful to Individuals
With ASD? Cont

• Provides information about what to expect in a
  particular situation and guidelines for the
  individuals own behavior in a format that is
  meaningful and relevant. Social Stories can
  increase structure in the individuals life and
  thereby reduce anxiety.
• Assist with sequencing (i.e. what comes next in
  series of activities) and executive functioning
  (i.e. planning and organizing).

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Guidelines for Writing Social Stories

• Tailor the story to meet the students level of
  understanding.
• Think from the students perspective.
• Observe the situation first hand.
• Phrase all sentences with a positive slant.
• Do not label the negative behavior.
• Keep visuals and words to a minimum.

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Guidelines for Writing Social Stories

• Social Stories are not scripts detailing
  appropriate behaviors, rather, they are
  descriptions of social situations which set the
  stage for the child to design successful,
  positive interactions.
• Avoid using absolute, inflexible sentences in
  your stories. Replace phrases like "I can" and "I
  will" with "I will try" or "I will work on" in
  directive sentences. "Usually" and "sometimes"
  should be used instead of "always" in perspective
  and descriptive sentences.

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Guidelines for Writing Social Stories Cont.

• There are three types of sentences used to
  present this information in a Social Story
• Descriptive sentences objectively address the
  wh questions where the situation takes place,
  who is involved, what they are doing, and why
  they may be doing it.
• Perspective sentences provide details about the
  emotions and thoughts of others.
• Directive sentences suggest desired responses
  tailored to the individual.

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Example

• Sometimes our class sits on the carpet.
  (descriptive) We sit on the carpet to listen to
  stories and for group lessons. (descriptive) My
  friends are trying hard to listen so they can
  enjoy the story or learn from the lessons.
  (perspective) It can be hard for them to listen
  if someone is noisy or not sitting still.
  (perspective) I will try to sit still and stay
  quiet during our time on the carpet. (directive)

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Social Stories (Cont.)

• Guidelines for Implementation
• Introduce stories as a reinforcing activity.
• Share common language of the story with the team
  to ensure consistency.
• May read before the social situation happens.
• Make reading a routine (e.g., one time per day to
  start).
• Monitor effectiveness-if no change in behavior
  re-write portions of the story.
• Fade over time or introduce a new story with more
  advanced behaviors within the skill set.

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What is a Comic Strip Conversation? Established
Treatment NSR.

• Developed by Carol Gray to assist individuals
  with ASD to develop greater social understanding.
• Provides visual representations of the different
  levels of communication that take place in a
  conversation, using symbols (thinking bubbles and
  thought bubbles), stick figure drawings and
  color.
• Having the parts of the conversation visually
  presented, some of the abstract aspects of social
  communication (e.g. recognizing the feelings and
  intentions of others) are made more concrete and
  are therefore easier to understand.

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What is a Comic Strip Conversation?

• Can be used to convey important information or
  for problem-solving and conflict resolution, to
  learn social skills, to follow simple classroom
  rules, to communicate perspectives, feelings and
  ideas.
• The effectiveness can be enhanced by
  incorporating a childs favorite cartoon
  character (ex. SpongeBob, Superman, etc.) into
  the illustration.

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Comic Strip Conversations

• The more involved the child is in creating his or
  her own comic strip conversation the more
  helpful it will be in future situations.
• Make a book of comic strip frames, and after
  leading the child through several examples, have
  them create the conversations and solutions on
  their own.
• Keep the conversations and use them as a guide
  and reinforcement if the same, or similar, social
  situation occurs again

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What Does a Comic Strip Conversation Look Like?

• Use symbols to represent social interactions and
  abstract aspects of conversation, and color to
  represent the emotional content of a statement or
  message (Gray, 1994). 
• A description of the event that caused the
  problem
• Feelings and thoughts of everyone involved
• A solution to the problem and ideas on how to
  avoid it in the future
• Appropriate symbols (stick figures, smiley faces,
  thought bubbles)
• Colors used to express feelings

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Conversation Colors Outlined by Gray (1984)

• Green Good ideas, happy, friendly
• Red Bad ideas, anger, unfriendly
• Blue Sad, uncomfortable
• Yellow Frightened
• Black Facts, truth
• Orange Questions
• Purple Proud
• Color Combination Confusion

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Example
I think I will ask that kid to play.
He called me kid, he doesnt like me.
Hey kid, do you want to play?
Dont call me kid!
Why is he kicking me? I just wanted to play with
him!
Im not a kid!
Dont call me kid!
Ouch!
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Example Cont.

• Tom called me kid because he didnt know my
  name, but wanted to play with me. The next time
  Tom or someone calls me kid Ill tell them my
  name and that I dont like to be called kid.
  Ill apologize to Tom and tell him my name is
  A.J. I will also tell him that I dont like being
  called kid and to please not call me that again.

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How to Implement

• Make small talk. Before discussing the problem at
  hand, engage the student in a light-hearted
  discussion that includes drawing. The purpose is
  to build confidence, likeability, and trust
  between the adult and the student.
• Draw the situation, using leading questions.
  Encourage the student to use stick figures and
  communication bubbles to draw scenes and actions
  from the situation or problem. (If the child
  cant draw, he or she can direct the drawing.)
  Use questions to gently lead the student into
  including important information and details into
  the comic strip. For example Where are you? What
  happened? What did you or others say and think?
• Share perspectives. While drawing, use this
  opportunity to listen to the students views and
  naturally share some personal insights about
  people and social situations. The objective is to
  achieve a balance between gathering insights
  into the students perspective, while sharing
  accurate social information (Gray, 1994).

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How to Implement

• Provide structure Gray (2004) suggests drawing
  boxes around different scenes to help organize
  the sequence of events. If the situation happens
  to be reported or drawn out of order, review the
  situation with the student and number the boxes
  according to the accurate sequence in which the
  events occurred.
• Summarize Review the comic strip, highlighting
  the key points of the situation to ensure that
  the student and adult have the same understanding
  of the situation.
• Identify a new solution Along with the student,
  identify possible solutions to the problem and
  discuss the advantages or disadvantages of each.
  The resulting list of possible solutions is
  options for the student to use the next time the
  situation occurs.

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Video Modeling-What is it? Established Treatment
NSR

• Video modeling is a teaching technique which
  involves having a student watch a model perform a
  target skill on a video tape and then practice
  the skill that he or she observed.
• Used to teach a wide variety of skills including
  daily living, conversation, play, or academic
  skills.
• Strong research base.

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Why is Video Modeling Effective?

• There are several key characteristics of children
  with autism that favor the use of video modeling
  over other learning techniques. A study entitled
  Video Modeling Why Does It Work for Children
  with Autism? (Corbett Abdullah, 2005) lists
  these key characteristics
• over-selective attention (making them very prone
  to distraction)
• restricted field of focus
• preference for visual stimuli and visually cued
  instruction
• avoidance of face-to-face interactions
• ability to process visual information more
  readily than verbal information

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Video Modeling

• Research shows little difference with using peers
  or adults in the video.
• Tapes should be short.
• Have the student watch the tape a number of times
  and then prompt them to engage in the behavior.
• To increase generalization, make videos of the
  target skills in different settings, etc. (e.g.,
  shopping skills-show video of individual shopping
  in multiple stores or buying multiple items).

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Contingency Mapping- NSR Established Treatment

• A Contingency map depicts the antecedent that
  triggers the behavior, the problem behavior, the
  consequence that follows if the behavior occurs,
  the desired alternative behavior, and last, the
  consequence of the behavior.

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Example
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Example
I Earn points and go out on Fun Friday
I ask for a break
I ask for help
I feel frustrated with my school work.
I put my head on my desk
I use impolite language
I loose points and miss out on Fun Friday
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Example
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Example
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Additional References

• Buron, K.D. (2007). A 5 Is Against a Law! Social
  Boundaries Straight Up! Shawnee Mission, KS
  Autism Asperger Publishing Co.
• Crooke, P. Winner, M.G. (2009). Socially
  Curious and Curiously Social. San Jose, CA. Think
  Social Publishing, Inc.
• Madrigal, S. Winner, M.G. (2008). Superflex A
  Superhero Social Thinking Curriculum. San Jose,
  CA. Think Social Publishing, Inc.
• Winner, M.G.(2002). Inside Out What Makes the
  Person Social Cognitive Deficits Tick? San Jose,
  CA Michelle Garcia Winner.
• Winner, M.G.(2007). Social Behavior Mapping.
  Connecting Behavior, Emotions, and Consequences
  Across the Day. San Jose, CA Michelle Garcia
  Winner.
• Winner, M.G.(2008). Think Social! A Social
  Thinking Curriculum for School-Age Students. San
  Jose, CA Michelle Garcia Winner.
• Winner, M.G.(2005). Worksheets! For Teaching
  Social Thinking and Related Skills. San Jose, CA
  Michelle Garcia Winner.
• McLaughlin, K, Topper, K, Lindert, J (2009).
  Sexuality Education for Adults with Developmental
  Disabilities. Williston, Vt. Planned Parenthood
  of Northern New England Education and Training
  Department.