

There will be toys and books inside of the presents. My friend may open the present right away or later, together with presents from other children. “When I see my friend, I will give my friend the gift I brought. Sometimes parents are invited to stay, and sometimes the party is just for kids – in that case, my parents will drop me off and pick me up later.ĭad : Bye! Have a good time, and I’ll see you in two hours “I’ve been invited to a friend’s birthday party! When it’s time for the party, I put on my clean clothes, take a present and go to my friend’s house. These are the extracts from the Going to a Birthday Party social story script, not the full story, but it can give a pretty good idea of how the social story shadow puppet kit works.

guidelines for creating your own social storiesĮxample of Social Story with Shadow Puppets.three example social story scripts – Going to a Birthday Party, What to Do When You Are Lost, and Making New Friends.sixteen shadow puppets ( four children of different ages, two adults, desk, front porch, cake, balloons, gift, ball, dog, scooter, bush, and playground).Social Story with Shadow Puppets Kit Includes Want more written examples? You can browse through this large selection of printable social stories. The number of social stories you can make does not end here though-you can create as many as your situation needs! Using this shadow puppet set, you can reenact a wide selection of social stories! There are silhouettes of four children of different ages, two adults, desk, front porch, cake, balloons, gift, ball, dog, scooter, bush, and playground.Įxamples of social stories you can stage with this kit include meeting new people, getting lost, buying something at the store, playing on the playground, interacting with a toddler, approaching a dog on a walk, greeting adults, going for a play date, going to a birthday party, and hosting a birthday party. While manipulating shadow puppets, children can role-play social situations, develop social experience and try out different social strategies. This will allow you to assess the child’s readiness for the situation and identify possible weak spots.ģ. Perform again with the child reprising his/her role or taking over the whole script. Describe the situation and ask questions, but let them make decisions and come up with answers. When presenting social stories with shadow puppets, you have the possibility to:ġ. Present the whole social story by yourself with the help of puppet manipulatives.Ģ. Make the story interactive by relegating one of the roles to a child. Social stories with shadow puppets take it a step further and add the elements of interactivity and role-playing. In their simplest form, social stories most often come up in conversations between adults and children, as the former prepare the later for an unfamiliar situation, such as a visit to a dentist or attending a wedding.īut if you want to make the experience more profound, you may look for an appropriate picture book on the subject – think about all those first-day-of-school books! When children read a social story book or watch a social story video, the pictures provide additional visual aids. That’s what social stories are good for! Why Supplement Social Stories with Shadow Puppets? If they lead a reasonably active social life during those first years, most children naturally develop a knowledge of social norms in the situations they are frequently exposed to.īut what if something changes throughout their childhood, and they must adapt to new social situations? A big move to a new place can influence the social situations they encounter, and, of course, beginning school when they turn the right age is a tremendous change in their environment! As children grow and mature, they get exposed to new social situations and need to come up with an appropriate response.Īs adults, we can help and prepare children for those new situations by describing in advance what will happen in any given situation. Meeting new people, going to visit relatives, attending birthday parties, playing on the playground, going to a doctor, taking a public bus - these are all examples of social situations that children usually get introduced to throughout their few first years of life. Over the course of their childhood, children find themselves in a great variety of social situations. Simply put, a social story is a story that teaches children how to behave in social situations. Getting ready for a birthday party, talking about what to do when you get lost, or outlining the rules of behaviour on the playground? I bet that as a parent or a teacher, you have done it plenty of times! The social story shadow puppet kit will make such conversations interactive, educational and fun.

Prepare children for new social experiences by making social stories and acting them out with shadow puppets!
