Social Skills Unscripted

Students sharing examples of using what they have learned at Starfish Social Club, the difference between laughing at someone vs. something, how we handle kids getting upset with each other, what we do when kids don't want to participate, and talking about the social context.

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The strategies we use to help our students recognize they are complaining (and what to do instead), suggestions for kids with communication challenges, and how we support our autistic and ADHD kids as they support each other.

Listen to the podcast episode HERE.

Watch on YouTube HERE.

The importance of teaching our autistic and ADHD students how to give and receive social feedback, what the most important natural social consequence is, and how we support kids with social anxiety.

Listen to the podcast episode HERE.

Watch on YouTube HERE.

Ramiro and I are talking about the goings-on in less than 2 hours with our students last week! We talk about why there's no such thing as doing things wrong when it comes to social skills, 'bad' kids, discussions about being popular vs. being kind, and a whole lot about asking questions to build...

Students solving a months-old conflict on their own (including how one of our more passive students stood up for herself), a student realizing he can be a leader and help other students, and a student putting in the work to change his reputation.

Listen to the podcast episode HERE.

Watch on...

Exploring the methods and strategies we use to help our autistic and ADHD kids learn to solve problems, discussing situations where kids may do things that are unfair to others, and how our students adapt no matter what group they are in or who they are with.

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How we do classroom management with our autistic and ADHD students WITHOUT using threats or punishment, including lessons getting derailed, side conversations, and students camping out in the restroom.

Listen to the podcast episode HERE.

Watch on YouTube HERE.

This episode focuses on how we support kids who experience anxiety about joining the group or being here at Starfish Social Club. Also a sidenote about the importance of letting our kids do things in the ways that work best for them, and a story about our kids taking accountability and making...

Thinking about others in the context of a group, why we don't settle anything by voting (and what we do instead), the expected response when an acquaintance asks, "How are you?", the missing component when it comes to our kids being willing to make different choices, and teaching the concept of...

We are talking all about our cohorts, which are groups of similar-aged students who meet every other week. One week they plan an outing and the other week we go do it out in the community! We work on ALL the executive functioning skills in the context of our cohort groups!

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Our most effective strategy for helping our students understand the natural, social consequences of the choices they make. There are going to be people who hear it and maybe think they can't imagine implementing this strategy or feel surprised that it's successful. It may feel a little extreme....

The number one factor that has to do with whether other kids want to be around our neurodivergent kids, or not! This determines whether our kids have other kids who like them, avoid them, or even go out of their way to be unkind. This one thing is what our entire program at Starfish Social Club...