The FDH Social Skills Program is an after-school play group designed and led by Speech-Language Therapists to enhance the social skills development in school aged children. The FDH Social Skills Program is uniquely designed to facilitate the following skills:

• Pragmatic Skills
• Social Problem Solving
• Friendship Development
• Nonverbal and Verbal
• Communication Skills
• Language Processing
• Idiomatic Language
• Pragmatic Prosody

Children gather in a supportive environment in small groups of no more than five children. Each group meets three times a week during the summer session. Speech-language therapists experienced with pragmatic language disorders teach and reinforce social skills development through structured social skill building activities, guided play, social stories, role play, modeling and other activities. Content and activities are used from a variety of sources including, but not limited to: Ryuu World^®, The PEERS^® Curriculum, Brain Talk^®, Zones of Regulation^®.

Topics presented in our curriculum include but are not limited to the following:

• Compromising
• Turn Taking
• Negotiating
• Sharing
• Following Directions
• Initiating Play
• Eye Contact
• Spatial Proximity
• Body Language & Nonverbal Communication
• Joining Others in Play
• Emotional Regulation and Control
• Manners
• Handling Teasing
• Tone of Voice, Pitch, Volume, Intonation/Rhythm of Speech
• Humor and Sarcasm, Idioms and Proverbs, Concrete Language
• Interrupting
• Complimenting Others
• Perspectives
• Dealing with Losing
• Recognizing Feelings
• Maintaining Relationships

Parents are provided with information each week to help reinforce the skills introduced during the group sessions. Families and caregivers are encouraged to use the skills and information presented in the program to help their child generalize the skills outside of the FDH Social Skills group environment and into the home, school and community.

The FDH Social Skills Program offers services for children having general social skill difficulties as well as those exhibiting more significant social cognitive deficits including, but not limited to, being diagnosed with: AD/HD, ASD, social communication disorder, and children with social-emotional needs. A social skills class can be fruitful for children with gifted intellect and social asynchronous development that may need some support navigating social nuances. We strive to provide a facility that encourages social skill growth and reinforces positive social development. Children are grouped according to age, developmental level, and to best meet the needs of each individual child. The FDH Social Skills Program is not designed for, or appropriate for, children with severe emotional and/or developmental disorders. Children must have basic reciprocal language and verbal communication skills to benefit from this program.