The Gray Center (2012) established five guidelines for developing social stories for students with autism spectrum disorder. Identify and briefly describe each of these steps. Give an example of each step.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

The Gray Center has developed five steps for creating effective social stories to be used with children who have autism spectrum disorders. First, the targeted behavior, skill, or concept that you want to teach with the social story must be defined. Student responses may vary, but an example that can be used is a student diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder who consistently goes through the lunch line hitting his peers. This is the targeted behavior that we want to change with the social story. Second, an appropriate replacement behavior that can be taught within the social story most be defined. If our child with autism spectrum disorder is hitting his peers in the lunch line, then a replacement behavior would be for him to squeeze a stress ball while standing in the lunch line instead of hitting his peers. Third, the social story should be written from the child's view point using pronouns such as "I" instead of "they." Fourth, the social story should include symbols or pictures that are relevant to the child. These pictures will be used to help the child understand the social story as children with autism spectrum disorders often have difficulties with written and spoken language. Finally, the social story should include a directive sentence for every two or three descriptive or perspective sentences. This creates a balance between describing the social situation and reminding the student what the appropriate way to behave looks like.