Social Communication Support
What is social communication?
Social communication refers to the verbal and nonverbal ways we communicate and interact with others. At Red Oak, our speech-language pathologists (SLPs) and occupational therapists (OTs) empower children and adolescents to recognize and celebrate their inherent communication abilities and build upon their strengths to learn new skills.
Recognizing, celebrating, and building upon existing communication skills
At Red Oak, our SLPs and OTs provide tailored social communication support to help clients develop skills in various areas. SLPs and OTs approach social communication support in many overlapping and complementary ways, but provide different lenses and areas of support based on their training.
We tailor social communication support according to your child’s needs. Some clients begin with one type of support, either OT or SLP, and may continue on to the second if necessary. Other children benefit from working with OTs and SLPs concurrently. Our Red Oak practitioners communicate regularly with families and with each other to ensure your child’s treatment plan continues to suit their needs.
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Self-regulation is an important foundational skill for working on higher-level social communication skills. Typically, our OTs support clients with self-regulation, sensory-motor, and/or spatial self-awareness challenges as a first step for clients requiring self-regulation support.
Some examples of this work include:
• Supporting a child's sensory regulation to achieve an energy state that best supports success when interacting with others.
• Breaking down individual skills and tasks involved in social interactions, and practicing these skills through role play and modeling.
• Building self-advocacy skills
• Teaching social thinking skills and social-emotional learning concepts to support flexible play skills, conflict resolution, collaborating and cooperating in a group, and problem-solving
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Clients who require skill building in areas such as conversation skills, understanding and utilizing non-verbal communication, interactive and cooperative play, and overall gaining language skills to express and understand their perspectives and emotions are supported by SLPs trained in social communication skill development.
Areas in which we may provide social communication support include:
• Developing conversation skills (e.g., initiating, continuing, or ending conversations, speaking about different topics, reciprocity in conversation)
• Arranging and/or increasing social activities
• Gaining the language skills to express and understand emotions in yourself and others, and applying these skills to self-advocate and resolve conflicts
• Building interactive and cooperative play skills (e.g., turn-taking, sharing)
• Navigating online versus in-person interactions and adapting social communication skills accordingly
• Understanding and utilizing non-verbal communication skills (e.g., tone of voice and proximity to others, facial expressions, body language)
• Building flexible thinking and perspective-taking skills
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We recommend an intake session if you need further help determining which services are best suited to your child’s needs.
An intake session is a valuable first step in determining which service best suits your child’s needs and treatment goals.
