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Project Goal

I am looking for an engaging way to teach social awareness and self-regulation skills to 50-100 (PreK-12+) students with significant cognitive, behavioral, and medical disabilities. Because of the wide range of both ages and abilities in our school, we need a variety of social skills curriculum's. The COVID-19 school closures have caused our students to experience more anxiety, social difficulty, and emotional regulation difficulties than when we were previously all together in school. The goal of the project is to teach students how to handle their emotions in an appropriate way. This project will help students learn how to self-calm when they are feeling too excited, angry, frustrated, sad, or any other big emotions. Students will know how to self-regulate as they navigate through different emotions, building their resilience skills and thriving in the process. These curriculum's will provide our teachers with evidence-based social and emotional lessons for years to come. 

 

How Project Benefits Students

The Superflex curriculum is 106-pages of curriculum containing lessons, activities, character profiles, and materials to create a personalized Superflex Superhero Training Academy for our students. Teachers will use curriculum to teach students to focus on developing awareness and encouraging the use of self-regulation strategies. Kids will have fun learning that they each have Superflex (a flexible-thinking superhero) inside each of their brains. Superflex helps them take on the Team of Unthinkables, cartoon-like characters who embody different behaviors and challenges. The curriculum outlines the powers of each of the 14 Unthinkables and teaches strategies to help students subdue each Unthinkable as it invades their brains.

Other resources included in this project are to assist teacher’s with improving student’s social thinking skill by improving self-awareness skills. It is only as an individual’s gain awareness of their own thoughts, emotions, and intentions that can they become increasingly aware of the thoughts, emotions, intentions, and actions of others. As a result, they are better able to use the information they have gained from their social thinking to inform many things they do throughout the day. Improving a person’s social thinking will help improve their social skills (social behavior), reading comprehension, written expression, narrative language, ability to work as part of a group, ability to make and keep friends, etc. Much of what we do in school and as part of the community requires understanding the perspectives of other people. It all requires social thinking. Students will be taught skills and strategies to help them develop awareness of their thoughts, emotions, and behaviors for improving social skills, coping skills, and enhance self-control with the hope that they will become more resilient.
 

 

Expected Outcome(s)

Students at my school come with a wide range of abilities, interests, and needs. In our integrated classrooms, we have respect and understanding that everyone is different, yet equally important. Many of these students have difficulty regulating their behavior. The Superflex curriculum provides a fun forum in which they can explore their challenges and identify ways to modify their thoughts and behavior in different settings. Depicting behaviors as cartoon characters (a.k.a. the Unthinkables) helps students learn about their own behavior in a non-threatening way. Superflex empowers and motivates students to self-regulate—reducing meltdowns and anxiety as students develop their own inner superhero. Students will ultimately learn how to manage their thoughts and behaviors that stem from their emotions. Students will become independent in taking breaks and finding the tools that are right for them. To meet some of these complex learning needs of our students, I need your help to provide resources for my teachers that they would otherwise not have access to! 

 

Detailed Cost Summary

The above curriculum resources are parts of a Social Thinking Methodology that is in complete alignment with Social-Emotional Learning as described at www.CASEL.org, Positive Behavioral Interventions and Supports as described at www.PBIS.org, and Common Core Standards, State Educational Standards, and Country Educational Standards from around the world.

The Social Thinking Methodology curriculum books and games above are designed to help individuals age 4 through adult with language and learning disabilities and for individuals with social emotional learning challenges who may have autism spectrum levels 1 and 2, ADHD, social communication disorders, social anxiety, and twice exceptionalism.

These strategies are taught by a wide variety of people we call “interventionists”, including educators, clinicians, families, caregivers, college students, etc. Professionals who use this work include speech-language pathologists, special and general education teachers, social workers, counselors, clinical and school psychologists, occupational therapists, behavior specialists, school administrators, and paraprofessionals, to name a few. 

 

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