Social Skills Class

I run a social skills class time with my students. I used to do it everyday. Unfortunately, the daily time has been crowded out for Quiet Reading, Writer's Workshop, and student discussion. I still slide in the social skills into that time period, but it is not officially written down in my lesson plan book for that. The school psychologist comes in one time most weeks and runs one now, however. We've agreed, though, to stop it as we come to the end of the school year and need the academic time and report writing time.

What kinds of things do I teach in the social skills class?

Where to start? I teach all kinds of things.

Some are the basics: what friends are, how to be nice to friends, strangers (friendly, uh-oh, helpful), sharing, and so on.

There is a part of that, a very important part, that I need to be more direct with. Things like how we sit, how we hold are heads and provide eye contact, how we behave, and all these other little things that they don't pick up on visually. For example, eye pressing. This is a behavior often seen in students with visual impairments. You'll hear the term "self-stemming" in special ed. We all do some kind of this behavior. What are doing now as you read this? Well, one is that you are looking or listening to the text. Are you fidgeting? Are you drinking a beverage or chewing on something? Wiggling your foot? Playing with your hair? Tweaking your glasses? Pay attention to the things you do when you are just listening to other people and that includes what you are doing with your eyes.

Anyway, eye-pressing is a habit that can form and if not stopped early can be nearly impossible to get a student to stop. Yet, how would you feel if you saw an adult pushing their fingers into their eyes? Probably a bit uncomfortable. You might avoid them if you didn't know better. (It is also bad for the health of their eyes which is another reason it needs to be stopped). Children who have vision learn to not do this behavior or others because they see the looks that are thrown their way when they do. Peer pressure can be a good thing from time to time. Peer pressure is often what helps to create proper habits (as well as a few bad ones (swearing)).

(If your child/student is doing this immediately provide a fidget toy or teach them how to twiddle their thumbs or play with their hair-just get them to stop (in a positive way, of course)).

Some students stand right in your face or right over what you are working on. I don't mind this when I'm teaching a concept and they need to see what I'm doing with my hands. In fact, I expect them to be watching what my hands are doing. However, when I'm just writing a note or separating papers, even I can find it annoying. I understand why they put their faces within inches of mine (they are trying to see my facial expression), but it still doesn't make it ok. They won't get away with that at jobs or with friends. They don't even like it when somebody else does it to them. When they fight over that, I do find it ironic.