For information on assessment and treatment programs offered by Dr. Jim Roche, a Registered Psychologist in British Columbia, please see his web page at www.relatedmindsbc.com or www.relatedmindsbc.com/autism.
Again a school district wanted to know about social skills training for kids with ASD (actually, Asperger's Disorder or high functioning autism as some people would call it).This request came three minutes after writing an email to another school psychologist who wanted to know about social skills evaluation programs for students with ASD. I suspect that both these programs are being managed by someone with little or no experience in autism, or any real theoretical background for that matter. Suggesting that ASD students, students on the autism spectrum, need social skills training is clearly a sign they are lost in the mae of terminology or don't understand the nature of ASD.
Sure, kids with ASD (autism) have some strange social skills at times. They come across in a strange way, and this deficit causes problems between them and staff, other students and even their friends. But the issue isn't one of social skills. A social skills program (like Skills Streaming by Research press, a GREAT social skills program) simply doesn't address their deficit. These students with autism have a deficit of perspective taking. Their problem is seeing things from the other persons point of view. It's a deficit of social reciprocity.
all the social skills training in the world will not teach your child reciprocity and perspective taking. Often, when working with teens with ASD I get, " Yeah, but it really doesn't matter....I did the right thing" as an answer to why they did some behaviour, said some statement or behaved a certain way in spite of what the social results were.
I'll just give the the bluntest situation, and one that I hear about a lot. A student passes gas, farts, in class. Then when another student makes a comment he gets in a prolonged argument. " It's a natural process..." "I had to do it, everyone does, it's natural." Because of the student's rigidity of thinking and inability to accept the viewpoint of others he ends up socially isolated and often picked on. Social skills training is NOT what this student needs.
Working from the perspective of "social learning" we address this student's deficit in social reciprocity, in perspective taking. The student needs to understand that his actions cause people to react a certain way, and from observing others we learn to understand how we are doing - socially. Mitchell Winner has a program called "social behaviour mapping" in which we engage the student in a process of understanding how others feels and respond by asking new questions. One set of formal questions we ask is: "Was that an expected behaviour, or unexpected?" Unexpected behaviours make people anxious, nervous and want to avoid you. Expected behaviours are more familiar, and we don't avoid those.
Sometimes other processes are used, such as social stories, drawings, mapping out the situation visually. This method of intervention addresses the key deficit that is causing the child difficulty: a lack of social understanding. In a social skills class you are unlikely going to get a student to engage in the social behaviour you want because it simply doesn't make sense to them. Often they already know the proper social skill, and make the choice not to engage in it because it makes no sense to them. Out job is to teach this skill of social reciprocity.
If your school is trying to put your child with ASD (autism, Asperger's Disorder of NVLD) into a "social skills" group they are setting your child up for more social failure because they are not addressing the real issue. Perhaps they understand and are using the wrong terms? If that's so, make sure and correct them. I also don't want people thinking that children with ASD simply lack social skills .... that often leads to a rejecting and punitive environment. Check out what your school is up to. And for more information feel free to contact me, or look up the work of Mitchell Winner on the web.
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