Dedicated to Advancing Social Learning for a Lifetime of Well-Being

Using the 4 Steps of Communication and the Social Thinking–Social Competency Model as a backdrop, attendees will learn about the role of social attention, interpretation, problem solving, and social responses as part of navigating the social world. We will explore how to teach and learn the evidence base for core teaching frameworks and a handful of unique and practical strategies based on the Social Thinking Vocabulary. Attendees will learn how one’s social attention to what is happening and the people in the situation can encourage understanding of the unspoken expectations for that social context. We also describe ways to teach interpreting and responding by making smart guesses and the relationship to social emotional learning.

Attendees will explore specific treatment strategies for how our bodies establish physical presence in a group (body in the group) and how we think with our eyes to gain awareness of the social environment, whether interacting or simply sharing space. Throughout the course, we emphasize how to make abstract concepts more concrete through clinical examples.

We’ll investigate how to teach conversational language by deconstructing the components, including how people share an imagination in the process. Attendees will also take a deeper look at how thoughts, feelings, actions, and reactions are linked to social situations, the people present, and what is happening through the framework called Social Behavior Mapping. Attendees will also learn strategies for dealing with the size of the problem, flexible thinking, and self-regulation as we consider how to think more deeply about social concepts required for navigation and regulation in school, home, and online learning environments.

Content Disclosure: This course does not teach about any other methodologies or programs aside from the Social Thinking Methodology.

If you’ve spoken to an educator or clinician in the past year, you’ve probably heard them lament about how ALL students are struggling more than ever with self-awareness, self-regulation, and building and maintaining relationships. Many of us are quick to spot behavioral issues but not as savvy at figuring out how to help. A place to start is let’s stop telling kids to “just behave” and “go make friends.” It’s not that simple.

Helping Students Meet Their Own Social and Relationship Goals

In this face-to-face interactive conference, Michelle Garcia Winner and Dr. Pamela Crooke, the co-creators of the Social Thinking® Methodology, will explore how to build social competencies in a proactive manner rather than correcting behaviors punitively. In the morning, discussions will center on specific strategies to foster self-awareness and self-regulation. In the afternoon, we’ll focus on visual tools for teaching students tools to meet their social relationship goals. Specific concepts for the day include:

• Discussing how social awareness and self-awareness are part of learning social competencies.
• Exploring how social emotional memory plays a role in social self-regulation.
• Exploring why some students might struggle to learn and/or be part of a group.
• Exploring when co-regulation is an important part of the self-regulation process.
• Rethinking the assumption that students will embrace the goals we generate.
• Exploring how to tap into students’ social desires to generate self-determined goals.
• Examining how assumptions may get in the way of helping students learn.
• Exploring how the social mind is at work within the classroom experience.
• Discussing the power of feelings, the amygdala, and managing feelings using visual supports