Every single thing you wrote is what we are currently struggling with. If you search my past posts, I have received alot of helpful information on this subject. There are so many things out there. Hopefully, if you take some of the information to the school, you can get something implemented. We are having an "ongoing conversation" about how to implement this and I'm currently waiting on a call back from the director of sp ed for our district. It seems that "time" is the biggest hurdle for the schools to overcome. Please, they have time for everything else, they need to make time for this as our kids need it to make it in the world.
Welcome to the forum and I hope you will find lots of info that helps you. The people here are fantastic and supportive!
Hi, I am the mom of a 9 year old boy with autistic disorder who is on the higher functioning end of the spectrum. He very verbal but has a great deal of difficulty in having a conversation with a peer on anything other than a favorite subject such as his grandmother's house. I am looking for sample iep goals and benchmarks and objectives for initiating conversations with peers and maintaining the conversation on something other than a highly favored topic. Also, if any of you have information on how social skills programing is implented. Presently he has a one one one teacher academic teaching in a segregated classroom and is included for special and non academic subjects. The school is resistant to having small group instruction for social skills as there isn't enough time in the day. For him, mere exposure to typical kids in a classroom isn't enough as all of his energy goes toward avoiding being overwelmed by the environment.
Thanks for any help,
Kathleen aka Bobby's mom
I wanted to respond yesterday, but didn't have a copy of Adam's IEP in front of me. He is in 7th grade and they implemented a program, in place of his study hall, it is called "Worksheets for Teaching Social Thinking and Related Skill."
It is a program our school uses and has units to complete. He has only been in it for a short time, but it seems to be working pretty well. He is at least beginning to think of other people.
By coincidence, I was just on the website of Michelle Garcia Winner, who wrote the book mentioned by Adamsmom, "Worksheets for Teaching Social Thinking." Here's a link to the book.
In my opinion, most schools seem to be out of their league when it comes to teaching social skills. Social skills are not part of the traditional curriculum, and not very many teachers have training in organizing such a program. Even those who have training don't always get results.
Here's a link to a topic on our forum with links to IEP goal banks. The first link is the best, hands down.
http://www.autism-pdd.net/forum/forum_posts.asp?TID=16265&am p;KW=IEP+goal
You might want to check out the Model Me Kids DVDs, which are surprisingly affordable for a specialty product:
What has worked best for my son is bringing a toy with him to school. The toy is a bridge that gets the other kids interested and which he has expertise on.
Good luck with everything, and welcome to the forum.
Thank you for the tip. I feel fortunate to have stumbled on this resource and look forward to learning and sharing stuff I've learned.
Kathleen
Well, appearantly our "ongoing conversation" has turned into "here's the IEP and we can change it as needed". Still never received my phone call back from director of sped.
Anyway, here is the goal for social skills as it is written on his IEP.
Current - Zachary does not initiate conversations with peers other than conversations that are related to sports he likes. His peers are able to initiate conversations on a daily basis with their peers on a variety of other topics.
Baseline - Zachary initiates 0 conversations with peers that are related to topics other than sports
Measurable Annual Goal - In 36 weeks, Zachary will initiate a conversation with a peer five times a week on a topic other than sports.
Evaluation Procedures - Weekly discussions with Zachary and peers, observation
Standard and Benchmark related to this goal - Standard, Personal Responsibility Benchmark, Identify feelings in different situations.
Positions responsible for services - sped teacher, gened
Specially Designed Instruction: Social skills group once a week during the 2007-2008 school year. Group led by teacher, social worker or counselor. 15 min. a week.
This is crap in my opinion. She put in the 07-08 school year because she told me she can't guarantee someone will be able to implement this next year. The 15 min. are being used on Wed. during his lunch and she is doing it in her room. She said she didn't know if the sped teacher next year would be willing to do the same thing. UGH!!
It is great to have this as a resource.
Kathleen Moline