Anyone here familiar with "Model me kids", videos for teaching social skills for

[jacqui in mo]

Kids with Asperger's? I just ran across these doing a google search on social skills. I don't have an official diagnosis for my son yet, but we suspect something like AS, and he could use training for his social skills. These look intriguing, but I always like to hear from someone who has actually used something as opposed to just reading glowing testimonials on the website.

http://www.modelmekids.com/autism-video-samples.html

Anybody have any thoughts or know other good resources for teaching social skills? One of the websites I was reading mentioned that role playing wasn't effective with AS; role playing requires some of the skills already be in place.

Jacqui

[jacqui in mo]

Bump

[MBM]

My husband recently read Influence: The Power of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini, and one fascinating example involved an experiment using a movie similar to the Model Me Kids movies to teach introverted, young children socialization skills (in this case, how to make a friend). After merely watching a movie of children attempting to befriend other children, the test subjects did the same which they were reluctant to do before. The children were only told to enjoy the movie -- no lessons or explanations.

Might be worth a try for you.

[Terabith]

You know, my girls don't have Aspergers, but that looks like a great way to teach some general five yr old social skills like not getting mad if you lose, etc, in a nonconfrontational way. Thanks!

[joannqn]

http://sweethomepress.com/

I don't have any diagnosis for my son. I just know that he has difficulty with social situations if his sister isn't there to help out. We've been using the "curriculum" linked above. It's just a book with very short (2 page) chapters explaining a skill with some activities to reinforce the lesson.

An example: to help learn to take pass the conversation by asking questions, you have a conversation with a ball. The person holding the ball is the person talking. They talk for a short time (few sentences or so) and then have to pass the conversation by throwing the ball to someone else. The trick is that they must ask a question in order to toss the ball.

[hsbaby]

Yes!! We just started using this last month and really like it. We watch a short video clip once a week and then complete the worksheets throughout the rest of the week. I have actually seen her use what she has learned. She seems to be thinking about her interactions with others and what they might deem as appropriate, rather than being completely absorbed in what she has to say. I am so happy to have found this as I pleaded with the public schools for years (she was in ps until 3rd grade) to address her social skills. Now I can do it at home and encourage her to utilize what she has learned when in public. For example, I will gently reminder her (privately) when she is talking to a friend about what we learned regarding rambling, interrupting, taking turns in a conversation, etc.

[Pippen]

They're getting rave reviews from parents on the Hyperlexia forums.