Plan/do

Accurate assessment of social communication needs ensures that the support and intervention is effective in improving the areas of concern.

Support for children at the social partner stage of social communication needs to concentrate on the following:

• encouraging children to initiate bids for interaction
• sharing negative and positive emotions
• requesting desired objects, comfort, help or other actions
• protesting undesired actions or activities
• commenting on objects
• imitation of actions or sounds
• using gestures (e.g.a give gesture, push away, a touch gesture)
• to make choices (through verbal or non-verbal signals) when offered by a caregiver
• to express negative emotion (through clear vocal or facial expression) to seek comfort
• to imitate behaviours modelled by others to self-soothe or focus e.g.  using a chewy tube, jumping, squeezing
• to use behaviours to make an independent transition – e.g. use of objects of reference, holding a comfort item

At this stage adults need to :

• focus on building a relationship with the child and making people interesting, desirable and predictable. 
• wait for, look out for and respond to the child's bids for interaction (eye contact, pulling, vocalising etc)
• promote child initiations by enticing them with motivating, developmentally appropriate activities/resources and responding to the child’s communicative signals, fostering a sense of competence.
• provide objects/resources to remind the child to communicate for assistance and engagement, and to support their understanding of language, social expectations and activities.
• use objects of reference or signs/symbols to indicate that a change in routine is going to happen

Strategies and resources to use at the Social Partner Stage:

• intensive interaction
• hands-on activities such as cause and effect toys, messy play, music, building
• see-through containers with preferred toys, food items, or materials that represent social games
• objects of reference, object timetables, ‘to do’ & ‘finished’ baskets 
• symbol/picture cards
• sensory and regulating materials (e.g. gym balls, chewy sticks), movement breaks
• modelling coping strategies, may be alongside simple visuals of emotions and coping strategies

Support for children at the language partner stage of social communication needs to concentrate on the following:

• teaching people's names and verbs as these word combinations are used in functional language
• using people, verb, noun phrases to communicate needs
• share positive and negative emotion
• choosing a coping strategy that is offered/modelled by an adult
• spontaneously starting an interaction that continues for at least 4 consecutive exchanges
• communicating to get someone to notice an action/event

Adults at this stage need to:

• provide visual supports, such as now and next boards, visual timetables, choice boards etc for smooth transitions and give predictability to events and to visually define steps within a task
• visuals to encourage children to use name, verb, noun phrases
• use a countdown boards before transition
• use emotion key rings to name emotions and give children options of how to respond

Strategies and resources to use at the Language Partner Stage: 

• comic strip conversations
• zones of regulation
• task baskets
• mindfulness
• wondering aloud to name feelings, explain events
• emotion coaching approaches
• social stories
• using name of child during interaction
• restorative justice approaches

Support for children at the conversational partner stage of social communication needs to concentrate on the following:

• increasing spontaneous communication with others
• increasing a sense of self-efficacy
• increasing awareness of social norms of conversation (e.g. balancing turns, vocal volume, proximity, conversational timing and topic selection)
• showing reciprocity in speaker and listener roles to share experiences
• initiating a range of topics, related to the other's interests
• , providing information based on others perspective
• gauge length of turn and amount of content in conversations

Adults need to:

• provide frequent opportunities for successful interactions with peers and positive emotional memories in settings and in social contexts.
• provide visual reminders for what to say, how to engage, and expectations of social and academic activities