Settling into new or different routines at school can be a challenge, particularly for students with autism who thrive in more structured settings.
Using social stories to help prepare your student for new experiences and school routines can minimize anxiety and stress surrounding the changes!
Throughout the school year, various routines may become part of your child’s week, such as riding the school bus, changing classes, and lunchtime clean up. Additionally, those routines may change like when there is a two-hour delay caused by inclement weather or during holidays when students are on break.
A social story should be written from the perspective of your child or student and will outline a specific scenario or experience step by step, setting the expectations of what they should expect to happen throughout the experience.
If we’re using riding the bus to and from school as an example, the story could say, “I ride the bus to school. When I ride the bus, it’s important to be safe so I don’t get hurt or hurt any of my friends. To stay safe I will stay in my seat, sit facing forward, keep my feet on the floor in front of my seat, and talk quietly to my friends.”
In the social story, you can add pictures of your child or student’s favorite TV or storybook characters to reinforce the behaviors you want them to remember. You can also use pictures or graphics to reinforce the steps and expectations outlined in the story.
Personalizing the story to your child can help make it more fun for them to read and help the points you’re teaching stick! Get creative and have fun with it!
You can use our sample social stories for school routines as a starting point to create your own or edit them to use for your child or student as they are.
These are a great tool for parents, caregivers, and educators!
This special education resource was authored by Watson Institute’s special education consultant, Lisa Plastino, M.Ed.
These behavior stories may benefit your students. They can be downloaded, saved and edited to suit your needs. The * notation indicates the story is formatted in a Power Point presentation and the ** notation indicates a Power Point with sound narration. Each Power Point has animation included on each slide. Some occur automatically – some occur on a “click”. Feel free to send comments or questions to [email protected].
Life can Feel Unfair – Lunchtime
Riding on the Bus (special interest – Planets)
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