Understanding and
Delivering Group Work
to Children and
Pre-Teens with Special Education Needs
Why is group work
with special needs effective?
Structured group work with children and adolescents is
known to be effective, be it in the classroom, counselling/ therapy group, or social skills
groups such as ours. For children with social and special education needs, the
effects of group work are not soley recognised through increased social and language
skills, but include improvements in cognitive, emotional and behavioural
development.
To design and develop groups that accommodate children's
developmental needs, we must first understand the basic principles of group work. These include group process development and
group dynamics at each age.
The Group Leader’s instructing, activities presented, and
the outline of each curriculum apply generally to group work with children and pre-teens.
However, some aspects will be adjusted by the Group Leader to account for children
with special education needs, and how they individually process, and respond to
tasks and follow direction.
Important points to
remember for group work with children with special education needs:
1) Children form bonds with peers in a structured
environment, one that enables them to interact freely and develop skills
without pressure.
2) Groups enable (older) children to understand that their ways,
ideas, thought processes and concerns are not unique to them.
3) Through appropriate structured activities, children explore
their experiences and feelings through play, learning new skills by observing
others and identifying with each other.
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"Learning would be exceedingly
laborious, not to mention hazardous, if people had to rely solely on the
effects of their own actions to inform them what to do. Fortunately, most
human behavior is learned observationally through modeling: from observing
others one forms an idea of how new behaviors are performed, and on later
occasions this coded information serves as a guide for action."
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Albert
Bandura, Social Learning Theory, 1977.
At Hometrain, our
groups follow principles of small group work, and the Group Leader uses a range
of appropriate interactive approaches to support and promote children’s
learning.
These include:
·
Play, and playful instruction. Making little demands
on children on arrival, increasing instruction and interactions throughout the session.
·
Attention to the activities and learning environment
for the children.
Group Leaders:
The activities in our Curriculums provide the Group Leader with
a range of teaching perspectives which they will adopt for both the whole
group, and each child.
The Group Leader:
·
Understands children as unique individuals:
their interests, motivations, reactions to experiences, language and emotional
development.
·
Achieves the aim of matching children’s needs
and the curriculum being taught.
·
Encourages children to undertake activities that
require a good deal of guidance and support which they may, under other
circumstances, feel unable to achieve.
·
Using appropriate language, and create opportunities
to use relevant communication techniques such as signs and PECS for each child.
Especially in the case of very young children.
·
Older children, benefit greatly from interactions
and opportunities to ask questions of the Group Leader and Support Staff. This
is part of Curriculum 3, in the ‘Radio Show Interviews’ activity. These are
designed to develop children’s social competence. Curriculum 3 uses role play
and drama activities to model desired behaviour, skills and scenarios.
·
Small groups allow the Group Leader to respond
in a range of ways to handle difficult behaviours sensitively and in ways that
might not be possible or effective in a whole class or 1-1 scenario.
·
Talkative children can be helped to listen to
peers, while withdrawn children, and particularly those with language
difficulties can be given greater opportunities for participation. This
includes prompting, and being offered time and space to respond.
·
Small Groups enable the Group Leader to determine
how children understand a particular task or activity. In a group, identifying
children having difficulty understanding a task can be noticed easier than in a
classroom situation.
Group Leaders in small groups continually assess children’s
learning and development. The Group Leaders and Support Staff participate in
all activities with the children.
·
Use 1-1 and circle time to clarify understandings
and purpose of the activity.
·
Observe the child’s attention by listening to
them, observing their behaviour and posture and thinking/reflecting on their
reactions.
·
Are sensitive to the child’s attempts to request
help and by responding to requests for activities and reinforcers.
·
Respond to the child’s efforts, and make way to
change/simplify the structure of a task or activity.
Teaching Special
Needs:
You could try simply sitting in a circle with a group of
children who mostly have ASD, and spend ten minutes trying to get them to sit
and talk. Would this work in a meaningful and effective way?
What is likely to occur? After 3 minutes, you will have a
room full of individual children entertaining themselves in solo play. Then
chaos as you attempt to re-group them.
Children learn by doing, which is why our curriculums are
play-based. The ideal learning scenario for children who have special education
needs, is where the Group leader actively engages the children in activities or
structured play throughout each session.
All 3 Curriculums are constructed with 2 hourly sessions of
planned activities, with a variation of teaching approaches throughout. What is
important, is that the type and nature of play used has a purpose.
We begin with playtime, then 1-1 teaching, circle time, big
and small group activities. Each session has a theme woven into the structure
of the session. Each activity and section has a purpose, the Group Leader delivers
each task or activity with the purpose evident throughout their structure.
As the age group’s increase, the level of structure and is
gradually reduced (Bednar, Mel nick, & Kaul, 1973). Older children become
less impulsive, and the relationship of structure and the nature of teaching
changes. When and how to do this will be evident to the Group Leader as the cohesion
and the group dynamics change over time.
The 3 Curriculums included in the manual ‘Teaching Hometrain
Social Skills Groups’ are:
Pre-Schoolers 3-5 Years
School Age 6-9 Years
Pre-Teens 10-13 Years – ‘The Nest’ Drama Group
Our group work protocol for children with special education
needs includes outlines for play activities as effective intervention.
Detailed Activity tables are included, and Template Activity
Programmes are provided for Group Leaders to develop each Curriculum.
References for further Group Work Study:
Yalom, L D.
(1995). The Theory and Practice of Group Psychotherapy (4th. Ed.). New
York: BasicBooks.
Association
for Specialists in Group Work, (ASGW) formed in (1973). George Gazda.
Website: http://www.asgw.org/
Social
Learning Theory, developed by Albert Bandura, 1977.
