Social Stories: Applications in Humane Education
By: Nick Kohner, CHES
Humane Education Coordinator, Lollypop Farm
What are Social Stories?
Social stories are a social learning tool that can be used by parents, educators, or professionals, and each social story is developed for a specific audience. They are not intended to be persuasive or entertaining; rather, social stories are patient descriptions of social situations that allow the audience to feel more prepared for a particular event or situation. This can include things like doctor’s visits, haircuts, funerals, interactions with peers, and much more. The goal of a social story is to help the audience understand expectations, feel more comfortable, process thoughts and feelings ahead of time, and practice how to respond in certain scenarios. It can also help the audience to understand others’ perspectives, cope with changes to routine, and understand how others might behave or respond in particular situations.
Here’s an example of a social story about wearing glasses: Wearing Glasses Social Story
Who are Social Stories for?
While originally developed for individuals with autism, social stories can benefit many children and even adolescents and adults! Knowing what to expect helps the audience to feel safer, build independence, and feel a sense of control in a situation. For audiences who struggle to manage impulses, social stories can help them mentally prepare and practice a skill before the moment comes. Social stories can be especially helpful tools for individuals with language delays, ADD/ADHD, ASD, sensory processing disorders, behavioral difficulties, anxiety, auditory processing disorders, and social skill deficits (Vollmer, 2023). Since many of us in the humane education field work as informal educators and this information is often not disclosed to us, social stories can help to make sure that all of our program participants have the same baseline knowledge.
How are Social Stories Constructed?
An important component of social stories is to abandon all assumptions. When we explain rules, processes, or events, there are many things that we would typically assume that our audience already knows and, therefore, assume that it does not need to be explained. When creating a social story, we want to make sure that everything is explained clearly and effectively and that nothing is assumed to be known. This will help us to avoid any confusion or frustration from our audience. Although the events or activities we’re describing with these social stories may seem straightforward to us, they can be ambiguous and daunting to our students, so it’s important that we approach the subject with that in mind.
The two primary components of social stories are the text and the photos. Both should be appropriate for the audience’s age and level of understanding. The language should be gentle, supportive, and accurate. If a particular outcome to a scenario is not guaranteed, words like “may,” “usually,” or “sometimes” should be included. For example, in a social story about seeing the eye doctor, the story might say,“The doctor might ask me to read letters or look at pictures that are on the wall.” Social stories use images to accompany the text and aid comprehension. Photos, pictograms, and illustrations can all be used to accompany the text. Stock photos and pictograms can be simple and effective ways to help students connect to the concepts in the social story. Incorporating the audience's preferences, talents, and interests in the story is also helpful and can be especially useful for those who struggle with attention.
When Can Social Stories Be Used in Humane Education?
In our work as humane educators, we are exposing children to many situations that they may have never seen or heard of before. Meeting a new animal, going on a shelter tour, and going to camp can all lead to apprehension and anxiety in many children. As educators, we typically expect program participants to let us know if they are confused or concerned about something that we are discussing. We often start lessons and activities by encouraging our students to speak up if they have any questions, but this still leaves the onus on them as participants to ask for clarity. In contrast, social stories give detailed descriptions of a topic in a way that doesn’t assume any prior knowledge or understanding. Because there are so many reasons why a child may not feel comfortable or even be able to ask clarifying questions, social stories can be used to make sure everyone has the same baseline knowledge. There are many social stories available online for a wide variety of topics and situations. They can be about general topics like going to school or more specific ones like going trick-or-treating. For our work in humane education, we will likely have to create our own social stories to suit our unique needs. Here are some guidelines to get started.
How to Create a Social Story
A social story should have a title, introduction, body, and conclusion. The text should answer the Five W’s: Who, What, When, Where, Why, and How. It should be made up of descriptive sentences and may also include coaching sentences.
A descriptive sentence accurately describes the context and usually answers one of the Five W’s. For example:
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My glasses help me to see.
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It is important to eat different kinds of food to grow and be strong.
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Dogs have feelings, just like humans.
A coaching sentence gently guides behavior. For example:
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I can ask someone to hold my hand if I am scared.
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If I need to take a break, I can ask the teacher.
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It is important that I don’t stick my hands in cages. I could spread germs or even get bit!
While descriptive and coaching sentences can both be used, the story should primarily be descriptive. There should be at least two descriptive sentences for every coaching sentence. Social stories should only use first-person and third-person perspective statements, no second-person or “you” statements. Ideally, the story should be written from your audience’s perspective, i.e. “I ride the bus to school.”
Let’s use these guidelines to write a social story about touring a shelter. First, let’s identify our audience and some questions using the Five W’s and How.
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Audience: Campers at Lollypop Farm
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Who: Who are the counselors, the shelter employees, shelter visitors, other campers?
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What: What is an animal shelter? What does an animal shelter do? What is adoption?
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When: When will we go on the tour? When will it end? When can I ask questions?
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Where: Where are we going? Where do the animals come from?
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Why: Why are the animals here? Why are we going on a tour? Why does it smell? Why don’t the animals have homes?
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How: How do the animals get adopted? How do shelters work?
Now, let’s use these questions to start constructing our social story. We’ll start with a title and introduction and then move into the body of our story. Each bullet point will be its own page, and we’ll just focus on the writing for now and get to the pictures later.
Title: Going on a Tour of Lollypop Farm Social Story
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Today, I am going on a tour of Lollypop Farm. Lollypop Farm is an animal shelter! (Introduction)
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An animal shelter is a place for animals to live when they don’t have a home.
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There are lots of people and animals at an animal shelter.
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Some people work here and take care of the animals. I know who they are because they wear a lanyard or badge.
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Other people are here to visit the animals like me.
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I tour the shelter with other campers. They are also here to see the animals. We are here to learn about the animals.
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The camp counselor leads the tour. They tell us about the shelter and the animals that live here. If I have a question, I can ask the camp counselors.
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On the tour, we go to many different rooms. The rooms have different animals in them.
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Sometimes, there are weird or bad smells at an animal shelter. It is okay if I want to cover my nose.
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The animals can be loud in a shelter. They might bark, meow, squeak, or make other noises. These noises can be quiet or loud. I can cover my ears if the noises are too loud.
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I will see many different animals. The animals here don’t have a house to live in or a family to live with. Right now, this is their home.
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The animals here are waiting to get adopted. That means that a family will take them home and make them a part of their family.
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Many animals do not like loud noises. Loud noises can make them scared.
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The camp counselor might ask me and the other campers to be quiet when we enter certain rooms. I will try to stay quiet while visiting the animals. The camp counselor might remind me to be quiet if I forget.
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The animals live in cages, pens, and pastures. These are like their bedrooms.
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It is not safe for me to put my fingers in their cages or try to touch them. They could get scared and bite.
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I will keep my hands to myself while I am on a tour of Lollypop Farm. I will get to pet other animals later during camp!
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Sometimes, the animal I want to see is hiding or napping in their cage. This is okay! The animals need to relax sometimes too.
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When we go outside to visit the farm animals, we are visiting their home. They are also waiting to be adopted.
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Farm animals do not like loud noises. Loud noises can make them scared. I will try to be quiet while I am visiting the farm animals’ homes. I can say hello to the farm animals by waving to them.
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I might see dogs being walked on leashes. They are going outside to use the bathroom or exercise.
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The dogs might jump or try to walk towards me. It is okay! The dog walker will not let the dog come too close.
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It is not safe for me to pet a dog at the shelter without asking. They might be friendly or not friendly.
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My camp counselor will tell me if it is okay to pet a dog. If I can’t pet the dog, I can say hello and wave at the dog as they pass by.
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There are lots of things to see at the shelter.
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When the tour is over, my camp counselor will tell us it’s time to go back to our classroom. (Conclusion)
This social story could be shorter or longer, depending on the attention span of the audience and the content of the tour. It could also include more details about different things the audience may experience. If we were to make this same social story for a different audience, for example, a field trip group, we would need to rewrite the story so that it answers those questions from that audience’s perspective. The last page should be the conclusion of the story. This could be descriptive, like the conclusion sentence above, or affirmative (for example, “I did a great job learning about meeting cats!”).
Here is what the final social story looks like with pictures added: Camp Tour Social Story.pdf. For this story, a combination of photos and stock images were used. Since this is a story of a shelter tour, actual pictures of the shelter help to give the audience an idea of what to expect and stock images are used to convey more general information and fill in any gaps.
Like any teaching tool, it is important to constantly reevaluate to ensure that it is serving the purpose we need it to. Although social stories are a simple tool, writing them can be difficult or confusing depending on your subject matter. Here are some resources to help you as you create social stories for your own humane education programs!
Further Reading on Social Stories
Social Story Examples
Help With Writing Social Stories
Disclaimer about “real” Social Stories
There is a difference between a capital “S” Social Story and a social script or lowercase “s” social story. Social Stories were developed by Carol Gray specifically for individuals with autism and must follow a strict set of guidelines to be considered a true Social Story. Social scripts, often referred to as social stories, are used for a wider audience and don’t necessarily need to meet every guideline. Here is a screening tool developed by Carol Gray to ensure that a Social Story meets all of the guidelines: It’s NOT a Social Story if. True Social Story or not, the social scripts we’re developing should still aim to meet all of the criteria. However, since we’re using these with a more general audience, there are some instances where not all of the criteria can be met. If you’re interested in learning more about the 10 defining criteria of Social Stories, the most recent criteria can be found here: Social Stories 10.0-10.2 Comparison Chart.
Citation:
Vollmer, Erin. “Using Social Stories to Improve Your Child’s Understanding & Behavior.” TherapyWorks, 9 Feb. 2023, therapyworks.com/blog/language-development/home-tips/using-social-stories-improve-childs-development/.
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