Teaching Social Skills to Students with Autism
Course Description:
Making friends and understanding social situations come naturally to most people. Our friends and family relationships are often the most fulfilling aspects of our lives. However, our students with autism find the world of social relationships confusing and frightening. Children with autism need to learn specific rules to navigate social relationships, make good choices in friends and understand the “silent” language of facial gestures, intonation and posture. In this course, you will learn how to teach students with autism to build positive relationships and to use the “10 Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships” explained by Dr. Temple Grandin and Sean Barron on a daily basis.
Goals and Objectives
As a result of participation in this course, students should
- Understand how students with autism view social situations differently than neurotypical students.
- Teach students how to interpret social rules and be polite.
- Develop interventions to teach specific behaviors needed to make and keep friendships.
- Teach students how to determine if their behaviors are inappropriate or offensive to others.
- Teach students how to take responsibility for their own behaviors.
Texts/Readings
The required text is:
Grandin, T. & Barron, S. (2005). Unwritten Rules of Social Relationships: Decoding Social Mysteries Through the Unique Perspectives of Autism. Arlington, TX: Future Horizons, Inc.