We have had a very busy month working to defeat Un-Wonderer and One Sided Sid! Did you know they are sister and brother and often work together? This was a big shocker! We started our the month practicing asking each other questions to develop friendship files about our friends. We use these "files" in our brain to recall facts about our friends so that we can strike up a conversation with them. For example, if I know my friend likes soccer, I can ask him a question about soccer. This is sure to get the conversation going.
We also discussed 2 BIG strategies taught in the book. Add-A-Thought and Ask-A-Question. This is a skill that we are still working on and will continue to practice this year! For example, if I say, "Next week is my birthday" you would follow up with comments or questions about that topic to keep the conversation going. We are learning what are good questions (What do you want? Where are you going? Who will you celebrate with?) versus questions that make the conversation go flat (What date were you born? Where do you live? What type of washing machine to you have?). We are also going to be discussing the next chapter called "Boredom Alert?" after break. This helps us sue our social thinking tools to determine if our conversational partner is interested in our topic or disinterested. We will practice the 2-3 idea rule. That is, we share 2-3 ideas about the topic and then Ask-A-Question or Add-A-Thought to keep the conversation going. Otherwise we turn into "ONE SIDED SID!"
Lastly, Superflex visited Mrs. Whalen's room to discuss the Unthinkable, "Worry Wall." Worry Wall makes us worry too much about small things or about social situations. We talked about some of the things that make us all worry. The students did a nice job sharing with each other and the group some of their own worries. We also discussed some strategies for defeating Worry Wall. Here is the anchor chart we created as a class. We also read the book, When My Worries Get Too Big, which addresses some strategies kids can use when they have worries.
Overall, the students should be very proud of how far they have come with their social thinking skills. Have a wonderful, flexible, and relaxing spring break!!
