Social Skills are More Important Than Ever

I can’t help but think of August as the real “new year.” A lifetime of being both a student and a teacher has conditioned me to view this time of year as the chance for a new beginning. Even though I no longer have my own classroom to decorate and prepare for, I still feel the buzz in the air as teachers begin to prepare for their students.

This year, as I reflect on the challenges that teachers will be facing this fall, I feel stronger than ever in my conviction that teaching social skills is one of the most important things you can do to help your students this fall, this school year, and the rest of their lives. 

For me, it was difficult to amass and then navigate the social stories library that addressed every issue I had in my classroom. And I quickly learned that I’d never get to teach reading or math until I taught the classroom readiness skills my students needed.

When I started using WonderGrove in my classroom seven years ago, it saved me so much time. I didn’t have to dig through video links, save Teachers Pay Teachers links, and track down social stories that were out of print. I was able to pull up a video instantly when an issue arose. “Pay Attention When the Teacher is Teaching,” “Sharing with Others,” “Keep Your Hands to Yourself,” I used these videos weekly!

Still, I felt like WonderGrove could work even better for my students. So when I had the opportunity to create WonderGrove extension lessons featuring real activities I used in my classroom, I jumped at the chance.

Fast forward to 2020, and I was working full-time for WonderGrove. I never thought I’d leave the classroom but it was exciting to me because I really believe in this product, I saw how it worked for my kids. After all of those years, the idea for a version of WonderGrove built just for students with exceptionalities was still in the back of my mind. It wasn’t until I was working with Terry Thoren and the WonderGrove team that I realized ‘Hey, we could really do this.’”

And that’s just what we did during the summer of 2020. WonderGrove S.O.A.R. for Students with Exceptionalities launched in the fall of 2020. We had teachers reaching out from all over the country who had always used WonderGrove with their students, but now they had a version built with their needs in mind. It was really exciting for everyone on the team.

One thing that was important to me when designing WonderGrove S.O.A.R. was using the same animations that my students loved. I think that so often, resources for students with exceptionalities aren’t written with a child’s age in mind. It was really important to me that we keep the high-interest animations that my students loved. What did change was the extension lessons. A team of intervention specialists spent all summer adapting the K-2 extension lessons to address the needs of students with disabilities, while still maintaining alignment to 85% of the Common Core Standards.

Next, the team began to add new resources. Thirty-six new videos addressing letters and numbers were launched on both WonderGrove S.O.A.R. and WonderGrove Social Skills in October. We made new videos with WonderGrove kids talking about their accommodations. New classroom resources such as bathroom passes, schedules, behavior bucks, and more were added to allow teachers to further integrate WonderGrove into their classroom routines.

As we look forward to this school year, I’m just happy to see my students reflected in the new content we are making. It’s important to me that students with disabilities aren’t an afterthought. Everything in WonderGrove S.O.A.R. was made with my students in mind, and I know that it will work for educators all over the world.

You can bring WonderGrove S.O.A.R. to your classroom here.