Reality and Misconceptions About Helping Kids Improve

Their Social Skills

December 28, 2012 By share

In order for a child to improve their social skills they need to first develop the foundational skills of social learning.

by Ryan Wexelblatt, MSS

As the Director of an overnight summer camp designed for children with social learning

needs I always welcome the opportunity to speak with fellow Camp

Directors. Inevitably the focus of our discussions often turns to how they manage

campers with social learning needs (typically those who present with ADHD, Asperger’s

syndrome or high-functioning autism) in their camp environment. I am always curious

to hear from my colleagues as to why they think the parents of these campers are not

interested in sending their child to a summer camp designed to help their child be

successful.

While these parents know there is a risk their child may be unsuccessful in these more

typical camp settings, they believe that the best way for their child to improve their

social skills and provide their child with a feeling of normalcy is by having their child

interact with neurotypical peers. This well-intended approach often backfires for the

child, particularly as they get older and social expectations increase and become more

abstract.

This has led me to question the widely held belief that children who present with social

learning needs can improve their social skills by simply being around neurotypical

peers.

The term “peer modeling” describes the concept of social skills development whereby

children are expected to emulate the language and behaviors of other kids, and thus

learn how to improve their social skills. Many of the children I work with have tried

very hard yet have been socially unsuccessful in camps and recreational activities

designed for neurotypical children. This is not due to their lack of effort, but to a lack of

understanding of what children need to successfully develop their social cognition (the

ability to think in a social context and apply social skills relevant to the situation) or as I

call it learn social. I use the termlearn social because I believe that in order for a child

to improve their social skills they need to first develop the foundational skills of social

learning that they have not developed intuitively like their neurotypical peers.

So why does this common misconception about developing social skills through peer

modeling exist?

When the inclusion model of education began to gain widespread acceptance it served a

great purpose -to help kids with various challenges be among their peers in school and

in other settings from which they had been excluded. I think it’s safe to say that any

child with some level of self-awareness wants to feel accepted and included, and of

course they deserve to be fully included in their school and home communities.

In school students who need support in math or language arts can have their needs

met through a variety of interventions. Often this is a “pull out” model where they go to

another classroom for the academic subjects they need help with, while still being

included with the general education population for the majority of the day.

But if a child needs help learning math, we would not assume that their math skills will

improve by being around peers who have stronger math skills, so why do we assume

that that children who have social learning challenges will improve their social skills by

being around peers who have more developed social cognition? (I define social

cognition as the ability to think in a social context and apply social skills relevant to the

situation.) Developing social cognition is a significantly more complex and abstract

learning process than learning math or other academic subjects, and it only becomes

more complicated as social expectations increase with age.

Clearly social learning is not considered to be a subject that warrants intensive

instruction like academics; it’s assumed that the process will just happen naturally. But

placing children in recreational environments where they will be faced with unattainable

social expectations is no different than placing a child with a math disability into a

mainstream math class without support. They are most likely going to get lost as they

try to process information that is presented to them in a format that doesn’t work for

their learning style.

If the way to help children improve their social skills were as easy as having them

spend time with their neurotypical peers, then there wouldn’t be a need for the work I

and many of my colleagues in this field are doing. It’s critical to understand that just

because a child has strong academic skills and/or a desire to be social does not mean

that they can be expected to successfully learn social on their own. A child’s social

learning needs are a learning need, not a mental health issue.

When parents and professionals do recognize the need to proactively teach social

learning they typically use psychotherapy or social skills groups. Yet the majority of

calls we receive at our office are from pessimistic parents who have invested a

significant amount of time and money in psychotherapy or social skills groups, only to

find that they have had little success. I have outlined two of the most important

foundational skills that are necessary to develop in order to improve social

cognition. These are based on the ILAUGH model of Social Cognition designed by

Michelle Garcia Winner, who created Social Thinking. Social Thinking is the framework

we use at Camp Sequoia and Sequoia Kids Program.

What Kids Need to Develop

Perspective Taking Skills: In order for children to improve their social skills they

need to understand that other people have thoughts different than their own and how

they are perceived by their peers. Deficits in perspective taking skills are the

foundation of all social learning needs.

Gestalt Processing (“Getting the big picture”): In order to be able to read social

situations accurately it’s necessary to take in various pieces of information and process

all this information together in a very fast period of time. To assume that kids who

struggle socially are able to take in this amount of information at once and organize it

in a way that makes sense in a matter of seconds is presumptuous as best.

It’s important to remember that the majority of kids who struggle socially also struggle

with issues of attention and focus. When kids are in settings with peers they have

problems paying attention to the conversation or activity at hand. Their brain may also

become distracted by external stimulation. Social interactions are analogous to soccer

games: they require one to pay attention to where the ball is in the game, where the

other players are in proximity to oneself and to tune out anything that’s happening

outside of the game. While some kids have the ability to hyper-focus on a task at hand,

many do not have the ability to focus or sustain the level of attention required to be

successful in social settings. Is it any surprise that many kids who struggle socially

spend their time at recess alone or avoid playing athletic games with the other kids?

We need to shift our understanding of how kids can actually improve their social skills.

It’s not going to happen just by sharing space with more socially competent peers, but

through providing them with education, support and the structure they need to be

successful. Social learning challenges must be addressed with the same (if not greater)

level of importance as writing or math learning challenges. To do this we need an

approach tailored to each student’s social learning needs and taught by people who

understand how to work with children who have social-cognitive challenges. And

because a lot of social learning happens outside of the classroom, we need to address

our children’s needs not just in the classroom but also in social and recreational settings

like summer camp.

As children grow their social world becomes more complex, and without effective social

learning interventions any delay in social competence will become more pronounced. I

encourage parents and professionals to think about social skills as complex learning

needs that require a unique approach that focuses on developing social thinking skills,

not just surface skills required for social appropriateness. As with any subject it will

take time, effort and patience, but it will pay off in the long run.