Social Thinking Course Descriptions

Discover an array of concepts and strategies that bolster social learning and help students meet socially based educational standards. Explore the ILAUGH Model of Social Cognition to help break down and make sense of the social world. Uncover how challenges in social communication, executive functioning, and perspective taking impact written expression, reading comprehension of literature, organizational skills, and working in a group—and learn strategies to help students, clients, and patients improve in each of the above! Rounding out the day: learn essential tips for effective IEP goal writing and data keeping. The information taught in this course was developed to help individuals with social learning challenges, but teachers tell us all students in their classroom benefit from learning these concepts.

Most of us can walk, skip, and run, but few of us can explain how we do this. It’s the same when it comes to our social selves. While we participate with others in our community, most of us can’t explain how we do this. In this course, we will demonstrate and explain practical assessment ideas, tools, and tasks to explore some of the many foundational competencies which help us to form and maintain relationships with classmates or friends. We’ll show how to implement and analyze findings from four informal assessment tasks found in the Social Thinking Dynamic Assessment. We’ll include video footage of actual dynamic assessments to reveal how individuals process and respond to social information in real time.

In this course, we answer the questions: What are core social learning challenges? How do we determine these challenges? How can we support learning and where do we start? Diagnostic labels such as ASD, ADHD, Twice Exceptional, Social Communication Disorder, etc. fail to pinpoint how to help an individual develop social competencies for use across the classroom, community and home. Nor do diagnostic labels help interventionists (professionals and family members) understand how social learning challenges are co-mingled with theory of mind, executive functioning and mental health challenges. In this course we will explain different types of treatment needs based on an individual’s social self-awareness, social-interpretive abilities, and social problem-solving skills. Learn practical strategies to develop skills that are required not only in relationship development but throughout academic curricula and standards.

Learn to help students better manage homework from classroom to home and back again. Explore the terrain between a student’s conceptual need (“I need to do my homework”) and the frustration that often results from an inability to plan or execute (“I can’t do my homework”). Concrete strategies to develop organized thinking and related skills will be explained. We will provide specific ideas to: encourage motivation; manage road blocks, emotions, and distractions; increase effective use of time; track multiple assignments; and more. Information can be used by attendees and students across school, community, and home. This course gets stellar reviews!

Both teachers and learners need practical ways to think about the social world. In this hands-on course, you will learn 15+ practical teaching strategies using Social Thinking Vocabulary and visual frameworks. The activities from this course focus on making abstract social information more concrete through lessons to teach social learners how to socially attend, interpret, problem solve, and respond to social information. Activities will also focus on strategies for teaching emotional understanding, theory of mind/perspective taking, and executive functioning to help learners meet their own social goals. Work in pairs or table teams to develop lesson plans for the home, clinic, or classroom the very next day. People love this hands-on, engaging course!

Our master class is designed for those familiar with the core teachings of the Social Thinking Methodology who want to explore hands-on activities for promoting social competencies. Explore the Cascade of Social Attention and learn how to enhance the social learning of students, clients, and patients by focusing their social attention. Use our observation-based tool to develop a deeper knowledge of treatment needs, consider social interpretation and response, and improve functioning for those with social learning challenges. Video will be used to support teaching strategies, including longitudinal observation of individuals over a 10- to 20-year span. Plus, get tips on IEP goal writing and connecting information to educational standards. This course gets fantastic reviews and routinely sells out around the country!

This strategy filled conference day delves into crucial aspects of building social competencies in preschool and early elementary-age students (ages 4-7). Explore how flexible thinking, social language, self-regulation, and social and emotional development are vital for developing collaborative interactions in group settings, both on the playground and in the classroom. Gain insights from a research perspective on the impact of executive functioning, social attention, and social problem solving through the lens of our award-winning We Thinkers! curriculum series. Walk away with practical strategies and examples to seamlessly integrate social learning concepts into your existing teaching methods.

Join us for this fun and motivating day of exploring the Superflex Universe! This newly updated conference day is filled with innovative strategies, lessons, and activities that will equip you with the tools to teach the Social Detective & Brand NEW Superflex series with fidelity across all tiers of instruction. Discover creative ideas for supporting social observation, self-regulation, and working & learning in a group. Explore the connections between the Social Thinking® Methodology and academic standards and learn how to foster Social Detective thinking, superflexible thinking, managing UnthinkaBots, and powering up Thinkables. Explore how to easily embed social learning concepts, strategies, and activities into your school day and existing lessons to unleash the social, emotional, and academic learning potential of your students and clients.

Treatment planning to foster the development of social competencies can be complicated the social world is complex! In this course, we explore a unique six-step decision-making template to guide individualized treatment planning to foster social development and social competencies across different types of social learners. We will explore conceptual and treatment frameworks and strategies from the Social Thinking Methodology as we learn how to understand and teach about how the social world works prior to expecting individuals to work (navigate to regulate) in the social world.

Using video from treatment sessions, we zoom in on strategies to promote social attention and perspective taking (theory of mind) with students, clients, and patients who interpret language very literally and struggle to interpret what others think and feel. These more literal-minded individuals—who may have a diagnosis of autism levels 1 and 2, ADHD, and/or sensory integration challenges—are slow to develop social competencies and exhibit a range of other learning challenges related to their weak socially-based critical thinking. Video-based case studies will offer treatment ideas and show how this type of student evolves in their understanding of the social world as they grow up. Attendees will receive checklists to help differentiate types of social learners and connect social learning to the educational standards. Group treatment ideas for different age groups will also be introduced. Attendees appreciate the practical information shared across the day!

Explore the needs of nuance social communicators who may have diagnoses such as autism levels 1 and 2, ADHD, and social anxiety as well as traits such as perfectionism, being oppositional, etc. Usually in mainstream classes, these individuals struggle with the intricacies of developing social relationships, working through assignments, and engaging in peer-based groups. Learn how even a slight impairment in flexible thinking, emotional understanding of self and others, problem solving, self-advocacy, and nuanced social interpretations can contribute to subtle but significant social challenges. Explore related treatment strategies while also learning tips to motivate students, clients, and patients to participate in treatment activities encouraging the development of executive functioning, perspective taking, and emotion management!

Adolescence is a complicated time, and it doesn’t help that the social rules continue to change and become more nuanced as we age. Some students are willing learners while others appear resistant to helping themselves. What’s a parent or professional to do? This course translates peer-reviewed published research on adolescent psychology, motivation, self-awareness, cognitive behavioral treatment, social learning challenges, acquiring independence, and more into hands-on strategies, clear frameworks, and concepts you can use immediately. Taking into consideration that the adult world focuses on access rather than success, we’ll explore job coaching strategies for literal-minded students, strategies for becoming more independent, and how interventionists can help prepare our persistently self-protective/resistant students. We’ll also share successful strategies for guiding our more sophisticated students in developing their own public relations and self-management campaigns. This course is packed with information!

This course is specifically designed to address the needs of adults with social learning challenges who have solid to high language and learning skills to figure out the more nuanced hidden expectations of the work setting. Providing logical tools to make sense of the abstract social world, we focus on strategies to encourage flexible thinking, spontaneous perspective taking, and the role of emotions in meetings as well as when networking with peers—and more. Explore case studies to teach specific concepts and watch video of adults discussing the treatment process. Anxiety, depression, and inflexible thinking and their relationship to social learning will also be explored along with related treatment strategies. This is a compelling and important course!

How much do we really understand about emotions? In this first course in our two-part series on emotions, explore the power of emotions, how the brain processes negative and positive emotions differently, and why this is important when helping individuals better self-regulate their emotions and behavior. Discover why negative emotions tend to take center stage and often become barriers to personal and academic achievement—and strategies to break the cycle. Explore how self-conscious emotions can shut us down or fuel our success, the impact of emotion on memory, how past emotional experiences can impact decision making, and more. Practice using hands-on tools and activities to help your students, clients, and patients understand their own complex emotions and ultimately develop self-regulation.

Emotions are at the heart of connecting with others and forming community. We expect children and adults to intuitively navigate the abstract nature of emotions by having emotional self-awareness and self-regulation, inferring the emotions of others, reading others’ intentions, etc. These skills are required for developing relationships, understanding the actions of characters in literature and history, working as part of a team, and much more—impacting performance on academic standards and success in the 21st century workplace. In this second course in our two-part series on emotions, learn novel treatment tools and strategies to help students, clients, and patients develop emotional awareness, explore how to read the emotions and intentions of others, emotionally sync with others, and work through social anxiety. To maximize your learning we recommend attending the course Emotions Part 1 before Emotions Part 2, but it’s not required since key concepts from the first course will be summarized in the second.

When a student says or does something that seems out of sync with the group, many are quick to call this a “behavior problem.” Likewise, when it’s hard to make a friend, or friendships dissolve into dislikes, we may see this as reluctance or resistance to building relationships. The reality is that both managing one’s own behavior and building relationships are complex. They require a foundation of self-awareness, social interpretation, and problem solving. This course will focus on how to rethink what is meant by “behavior problems” and teach lessons that encourage the development of social competencies to meet one’s own personal social goals. We will also unpack different aspects of peer-based relations, from friendship to dislike, and provide practical tools and perspective-taking activities to encourage student motivation to continue developing increasingly complex relational competencies as they age.

The Social Thinking® Methodology and its practical concepts and strategies are being used in schools around the world. Social Thinking was originally developed for individuals with social emotional learning differences. More recently, however, the value of the frameworks, concepts, and strategies is being recognized on a wider scale and adopted as part of social-emotional learning programs for all students. In this course, we will explore how individuals, schools, and systems can implement Social Thinking in a systematic, effective, and sustainable way.

We are packing our latest thinking and sharing our most helpful strategies by consolidating core topics, tailored to offer a deeper understanding related to assessment, goals and measurement, and practical teaching tools. This course offers ample time for networking, sharing practical lessons and strategies, as well as engaging in robust Q&A sessions with the instructors and fellow attendees.