A large proportion of students with disabilities (SWD) have social skills deficits that make it difficult for them to succeed in school, work, and life. This quantitative, quasi-experimental, non-equivalent, pretest-posttest, control group study was designed to explore whether SWD can better transfer their learned social skills to natural settings, improving their chances at independence and success, with the use of reinforcement in natural settings. The researcher included 86 students with disabilities from a school district in a predominantly white, middle class, rural Utah town. The researcher and teachers used Social Skills Improvement System (SSIS) in this study to provide instruction in social skills to SWD. The Social Skills Rating Scales (SSRS) are scales that were created to measure the success of the SSIS. The researcher used these scales to determine the baseline data for each of the students and to measure the change in social skills behavior of the participants from the pretest to the posttest. The difference in pretest to posttest scores of the control group was compared to the difference in pretest to posttest scores of the experimental group. The researcher used an ANCOVA to determine if there was a significant difference in the amount of change in the pretest to posttest scores of the experimental and control groups upon completion of the study. The results showed an improvement in the social skills scores for both groups after the SSIS program. The experiment group achieved better results, although these results were not statistically significant. Future research should replicate the study while focusing on different demographics and specific disabilities. The theoretical framework for this study was Bandura’s social learning theory.

Social skills may impact a student with a disability more than the disability itself. Learn the social deficits and challenges associated with disabilities as well as strategies to support social skill development. A variety of professionals share their success strategies so readers (parents, teachers, counselors, psychologists, and others working in the disability field) can incorporate them into their professional “toolbox” and practice. Included are strategies from Special Educators, School Counselors, Licensed Professional Counselors, an Occupational Therapist, and a Psychologist. Current issues such as bullying are explored in addition to ways that professionals and universities should be involved in supporting social skills of students with disabilities. A special section on working with parents includes a handout with strategies parents can use while social skills are developing in their child.

This social skills manual will present to teachers and parents lesson plans complete with literature stories, vignettes, and other activities to help students with disabilities develop social skills in all their environments. The general skills and social skills at work are presented within detailed lesson plans that place emphasis on the vocabulary and the different lesson plan objectives that are essential to each lesson. These generic skills will enhance an individualfs ability to access social contexts in which healthy engagement can occur and improve the ability to cope with challenging tasks that are encountered in daily living. The diversity of instructional techniques used to facilitate content mastery include guided and differentiated instruction, modeling, facilitating analysis and reflection of situations involving the appropriate and inappropriate use of key skills, presentation and discussion of positive and negative consequences of each skill, independent learning, and connecting lessons learned to the central idea of the skills being taught. These strategies are arranged in a logical order wherein the material mastered via one technique builds upon prior ones and provides a context for the next one in the instructional sequence. In most cases, it seems highly likely that students who are led through this sequence could not fail to acquire important information about understanding and applying these skills to their own lives. This important new resource will enable professionals to be more effective in assisting students with disabilities in negotiating the many challenges in making the transition from school to the world of adult living.

Social interaction skills are a core area of deficit for individuals with an autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and often limit the opportunities these individuals have to develop meaningful friendships. School is an ideal setting to address these challenges, as there are many peers are available to practice social interaction skills. However, without support, students with an ASD often do not interact with their peers. Therefore, social skills support in schools is important to address the social development of children with ASD. At this time, though, there is a limited amount of support for interventions to address the social challenges of children with ASD in school settings. Currently, it is recommended that social skills interventions be provided in natural settings at school rather than analog settings. However, it is uncertain if natural environment interventions are considered more effective because of the setting they are provided in or the intervention procedures used in these settings. The current study evaluated a social skills intervention using evidence-based naturalistic teaching procedures provided in an analog setting (i.e., special education classroom). Five students with ASD in kindergarten through 2nd grade were identified to participate in this research study. The intervention was implemented daily by special education staff members (two special education teachers and two special education assistants) who received training and ongoing consultation. Additionally, fidelity of implementation of the intervention was measured throughout the study and the social validity of the intervention was measured prior to and following the implementation of the intervention. Results of this study indicate that the intervention was implemented with high fidelity for all five participants (range: 97-100%) and participants showed significant increases in the percent of time they were engaged in social play and/or conversation with peers following the introduction of the intervention (p = .0026). Findings based on visual analysis provide support that naturalistic interventions conducted in an analog setting can produce significant increases in the social behaviors of students; however, these changes did not generalize to natural settings. Social validity data from this study indicates that educators and students who participated in the intervention found the intervention goals to be socially important, the intervention procedures to be feasible and acceptable, and the intervention to be effective.

Abstract: Children and youth with disabilities, especially those with mental, emotional, and learning disabilities often demonstrate deficits in social competence (Cartledge & Milburn, 1978; Gresham, Sungai, & Horner, 2001). Within a school environment, these deficits are commonly observed in physical education and sport settings (Buchanan, 2001; Hellison, 2003; Bloom & Smith, 1996). Yet, little has been done to enhance the social skills of children with disabilities (especially those with emotional or behavioral disorders) in physical education and sport settings. According to social learning theory (Bandura, 1977) behaviors are learned and thus, direct instruction can be employed to teach appropriate social behaviors. Therefore, purpose of this study was to examine the effect of social skill instruction (within the context of social learning theory) on the acquisition, maintenance, and generalization of peer related social behaviors of students with emotional or behavioral disorders (EBD) during competitive sports/games activities. A multiple baseline across participants design was used. The experiment specifically addressed the effect of social skill instruction on the number of appropriate and inappropriate sport/games behaviors during physical education. The instruction was based on a Sports and Games Behaviors Curriculum that was developed and validated. Six students (4 males and 2 females) ages 10 through 17 and attending two alternative education school programs designed to serve children and youth with EBD participated in this study. Results of this study demonstrated that social skill instruction was an effective strategy to develop appropriate sport and game behaviors and decrease inappropriate ones for students with EBD in physical education. However, there was limited support for generalization. Social validity results demonstrated that parents and teachers support the curriculum as implemented to develop appropriate sport and game behaviors. Although further investigation is needed, the intervention was effective in improving appropriate behaviors and decreasing inappropriate ones.