Ten Ways To Improve Social Skills

Improving social skills is an important step for children as they grow. Some kids with special needs, including those with Asperger syndrome and social anxiety, will require more attention and support with building friendships due to their social awkwardness. Young children, in particular, will benefit from a teacher’s ability to bridge the gap between themselves and their peers and classmates.
Once children move through the elementary (primary) grades into middle school and high school, the support they are given by adults in order to foster relationships should be increasingly transparent, allowing the students to become more independent and also more reliant on their peers for comfort and support instead. This will further increase their social skills and therefore, strengthen their abilities to form peer friendships.
Ten Ways to Improve Social Skills in the Class
Teachers play a key role in the social success of students in their classrooms. There are many ways to help each individual to build social confidence. Social skills are not only important as a student goes through school, they are absolutely essential in the real world. Here are ten suggestions to help a student who has social anxiety, Asperger syndrome, or other special need that may cause social awkwardness.
Point out the common interests of students and help initiate conversations.
Teach student how to join in with others, using appropriate words and actions.
Give social rewards for academic successes, such as a popcorn party, extra recess with a buddy or allowing a student to sit near a friend during snack time in the classroom.
Start a lunch bunch for a student with social issues by slowly increasing the group from one or two close friends to four or five.
Create classroom jobs that are social in nature.
Talk about the special need and any assistive devices the student may be using with peers in the classroom.
Assign a compassionate classroom buddy/hallway buddy to the student with social issues.
Use social stories with the student to teach the rules of social interaction.
Encourage the student to share feelings and interests with others using effective conversation starters.
Highlight academic successes and strengths of the student with special needs and let his enthusiasm shine in the classroom.
Slowly Removing Adult Support for Child With Special Needs
Once the seeds for social success are planted for a student with special needs, the teacher or paraprofessional should simply step aside somewhat, observe, and build on what the student has been taught. By letting the roots of friendship grow, a true relationship may blossom.
The teacher will still need to keep her eye out for bullying, teasing and other situations that may need supervision. But sticking too closely to a child with special needs all the time may discourage her from seeking out other relationships, and can also discourage peers from approaching in a positive way. In particular, the student with social issues really needs to feel like she belongs, and that may be difficult with an adult continually hovering by.
One of the greatest benefits of slowly fading support will be that the student might eventually seek out the help of a peer instead of an adult, further enhancing her social abilities as well as her independence. It takes practice for a teacher to be able to balance critical support and transparency, but each social situation will dictate what types of assistance, if any, a teacher should offer the student with special needs.
An important job of any classroom teacher is ensuring that every student that struggles socially has the same opportunities as her peers to build meaningful relationships in class. A student with special needs that has at least one or two good friends will be less likely to be teased and bullied. That same child with strong bonds of friendship will also gain critical self-confidence that will, in turn, enhance her quality of life.
For more ideas on how to encourage social skills, readers may be interested in Social Skills Activities in the Classroom. For children that are nonverbal or have speech disorders that may prevent or delay social success, check out Augmentative Communication and Social Skills.