Things you will learn at our new workshop....

Social Skills are the hot topic for Hometrain right now, and preparations for our new workshop on October 12th are going well.

The tag line for this workshop is:

"Using Practical Ideas and Play Methods to Teach Children Social Skills"
- and it will do exactly what it says on the tin (with empahsis on the word Practical).
So what will you learn?

• About social skills
• How to write social stories
• How to write songs for social skills
• What you need to begin social skills teaching
• Techniques about working with challenging behaviour
• Enough new social skills games and activities to last a lifetime!

There's a FREE copy of new game 'Hello' for everyone in the audience, a fab resource pack and lots more.

If you haven't booked your place yet, remember the closing date is October 5th. To print a booking form click here:
http://www.hometrain.ie/download.php?file=Blanch_Workshop_Booking_Form.pdf

It's at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, Blanchardstown 7:30-9:30pm - all other details are on our site: http://www.hometrain.ie/workshops/

See you there,

Claire.

Why I should not shout in class...

Why social skills teaching?

We want our children to be able to relate to others and for other's to

respond well towards them.

Right.

When debating this statement with one of my social skills students:
'Why I should not shout in class'
John is 7. I asked the question.
John: Because its too loud
Claire: How will the teacher feel?
John: Sad. No wait... (pause) Angry
Claire: Why is that?
John: Because it's too loud and I'm being too loud

Consider what's invloved in teaching the social skills lesson relating to the statement:
Does he worry about what the teacher thinks of his behaviour? What's his understanding of his peers' perspective? He knows not to shout, and he knows it's too loud, so why does he keep doing it? How can he tell the teacher is both sad and angry? Does he understand and accept there are consequences to his behaviour? Why should/shouldn't he raise his voice to be heard? The list goes on.

In previous sessions, and with John's parents, we established:
1) How John relates to others
2) What difficulties he has interacting
3) At what level is his understanding in relation to his peers

With our list, we then unpick the social skills and rules for each behaviour John has difficulty with, and combining our knowledge of John's:

• Thought processes
• Social and emotional skills
• Flexibility of thought (If I shout in class, then....what will happen?)
• Imagination skills

The we can devise a social skills teaching plan that is effective. (hopefully)

I am certainly not advocating 'normalisation' of our children - the world is full of people who communicate in different ways for a multitude of reasons. Each one of us has our communication difficulties. I am of the opinion that combining flexibility of thought and social rules with imagination will be a help a child's skills in relating to and responding to others.

(You may have noticed that right now I am preparing for the upcoming social skills workshop in October.)
The challenge of producing ideas to help teach social skills is interesting, fun and mindbending! They are like ancient philosophies - the more you think about them, the harder and more complex they get!

'What's the sound of one hand clapping?' is the social skills equivalent to 'Why I should not shout in class'.

Claire.

Ten things you may not know about us....

With an online company, it's hard to show people just how normal and customer-friendly we are. I'm starting to get a bit confused between Faceland, blogs and just how much personal info people really miss out on not meeting us face-to-face here at HT.
Well, we are quite normal. In case you didn't already know......

1) Hometrain is run by husband and wife team Claire and William Whyte.
2) We design and produce all our products here in Ireland.
3) Teaching workshops are part of our main face-to-face contact with our customers.
4) We are developing a series of 5 social skills computer games.
5) We aim to be Ireland's leading social skills resource company.
6) Claire has a social skills group called 'Hello' on Saturdays.
7) Claire is a play specialist and a teacher. She's the writer, illustrator and director.
8) William is the designer, producer, programmer, director and web designer.
9) William can speak Spanish, secretly likes heavy metal and is a bit of tech-head.
10) Claire is expecting baby number two and is quite good at baking cakes.

So I hope that's cleared up a few details - looking forward to meeting any of you who are coming to our social skills workshop on 12th Oct. See you there!

Claire.

Helping Your Child Make Friends

Which Social Skills does your child need in order for them to make friends?

Basic Social skills do not come naturally for many children and as they get older, they might catch up on the academic work, and struggle with the social interaction.

This is the case for many children who attend our social skills group in Meath.

Social skills by their nature are difficult to teach - especially to children who appear to have little motivation to interact with peers (unless they want something....) - so what can you do?

Consider these questions:

Does your child understand what 'friends' are?

Do they know what does 'Hello' means? and we say it?

Can they answer 'What's your name?'

The answer to these questions will give you a place to start.

In our group, we begin with basic 1-word social skills and build from there. You can do th same at home.

Tips to teach basic communication skills:

1) Use 'Hello' and 'Hello (name)' when you meet people. Encourage your child to look at, say or sign 'hello' to someone at least once every day.

2) See if they can remember something about their friend or friends - such as their names, what they are wearing, what they played with at school etc.

3) Practice answering 'what's your name?' - use their name as a prompt with the answer.

These basic questions are the ones many people will be asking your child out and about, or at school. If they can understand everyday questions and reply, it will help build your child's social confidence. When they can make basic social interactions, further attempts will follow.

All of these questions are covered in our social skills game 'Hello' which is designed to teach these skills - take a look at: http://www.hometrain.ie/ 'Hello', free social skills info and printables.

Claire.