Social Skills

In speech language therapy, we work on a variety of goals. Many people associate speech therapy with working on speech sounds or stuttering. However, most of what I do all day involves helping children with language skills. Language is a broad term that can broken into the form (ie. grammar), content (ie. vocabulary) , and use of language (ie. pragmatics). Pragmatics is a fancy way to say social skills. Some of the social skills we might work on include starting and maintaining a conversation, turn taking, staying on topic, perspective taking, and interpreting nonverbal cues/ body language. While many of us learned these social skills without even thinking about it, some students need direct instruction on the hidden curriculum or unspoken social rules.

In my therapy sessions, there are several resources that I use on a regular basis. My favorite resource is Socialthinking.com. They offer many great ideas and products to help student work on social skills. Some examples include The Incredible Flexible You and Superflex: A Superhero Social Thinking Curriculum. I often find great social skills ideas on the SLP Jill Kuzma's website https://jillkuzma.wordpress.com/.

Many of my students benefit from the Zones of Regulation, an approach to develop self-regulation which was created by an occupational therapist Leah Kuypers. As stated on their official website http://www.zonesofregulation.com/index.html ,

"The Red Zone is used to describe extremely heightened states of alertness and intense emotions. A person may be elated or experiencing anger, rage, explosive behavior, devastation, or terror when in the Red Zone.

The Yellow Zone is also used to describe a heightened state of alertness and elevated emotions; however, one has some control when they are in the Yellow Zone. A person may be experiencing stress, frustration, anxiety, excitement, silliness, the wiggles, or nervousness when in the Yellow Zone.

The Green Zone is used to describe a calm state of alertness. A person may be described as happy, focused, content, or ready to learn when in the Green Zone. This is the zone where optimal learning occurs.

The Blue Zone is used to describe low states of alertness and down feelings, such as when one feels sad, tired, sick, or bored."