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Social groups

bliss611bliss611 member
in Special Needs
How effective are socialization groups?

DS was diagnosed as being on the spectrum (per the psych, the old criteria would have diagnosed him as PDD-NOS) about 2 months ago. It was labeled as mild so no intensive therapies were recommended. He is currently getting PT, OT, and ST at various locations through the school year. In September, he will get all that, counseling, and be in an integrated classroom. He will have no services during the summer. I am planning to continue OT and ST through the summer through our health insurance - which will be a significant cost in copays.

The therapy place he goes to has a social group during the summer to help special needs children will socialization skills. I am wondering if anyone has experience with these and what your thoughts are. The description sounds like something that would benefit him but it's not cheap and insurance will not cover any behavioral treatments.

Appreciate any thoughts or experiences before I decide.
TIA!
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Re: Social groups

  • MirandaHobbesMirandaHobbes member

    Probably largely depends on the type. DS did attend this type of "social skills" class from ages 3.5 to 5. It was 9 hours a week and because there was an OT and ST present, it was covered by insurance but-for copays which were still significant. I'm glad we did it. 9 hours a week allowed him sufficient time to really dig into the material. They used Michelle Garcia Winner curriculum which is widely praised as being effective. DS learned how to self regulate and be better about taking turns, etc. He doesn't need traditional ST because his artic and vocab is so high; he struggles with conversations adults and mainly kids. This class worked primarily on that.

    Now that DS is in kindy I'm not sure if we'll continue a social skills class. We have the option of paying OOP for one hour a week, but I'm not sure an hour is worth it. He may benefit from it if it is more of a "friend" group, like something led by a psych where kids just hang out and play games, etc. But if the other children are very impaired, it may not be so effective. I posted this discussion awhile back on this board and many seemed to agree as you get older you either continue with some sort of rote social skills curriculum to learn the nuts and bolts, or at the very least find some peer to peer interaction that is structured and supervised by competant adults to facilitate interactions.

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  • Assembly_ReqdAssembly_Reqd member
    You may want to look into any University master's programs in your area that have practicums for their students in the form of speech or social camps.

    You child could be paired with a graduate student who is supervised by a professional. Nate will be going to a speech one for 3-6 year olds that is 5 weeks long, 4 morning a week for 1200 bucks. Ends up being about 35 dollars an hour. The social group one is even cheaper at 600 for 7-10 year olds. They will also give you forms to submit to your insurance to try and get the sessions covered.

    Good Luck!
    WAY 2 Cool 4 School


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  • d.fd.f member
    edited April 2014
    The social skills group DS went to was definitely beneficial and we will be doing a second 12-16 week session over the summer. It's facilitated by an OT and a SLP so our insurance was billed for one of each a session (we actually paid OOP for 9 sessions of the speech part because we had hit our max of 30 sessions of speech a year).

    He has also attended one at the rec center facilitated by a Psych and run out of our local rec center. It was about 1/2 the cost of therapy centers. The session we did wasn't hugely beneficial but I think it was primarily because she combined age groups due to limited interest.

    He also attends a social skills group at school. They the school psych uses the Michelle Winner-Garcia Curriculum and it has been beneficial.

    So I guess the short of it is that it really depends on the group and the facilitator.

    DS 09/2008

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