Social Skills Activities for Kids: 50 Fun Exercises for Making Friends, Talking and Listening, and Understanding Social Rules

by Natasha Daniels LCSW

Overview

Help kids thrive in the new school year with activities for developing essential social skills—for ages 6 to 10

What are the Dos and Don'ts for making and keeping friends? How can you decode body language clues? What's the best way to keep a conversation going? Just like learning multiplication tables, social skills don't come naturally—everyone has to learn them. Luckily, Social Skills Activities for Kids makes mastering social skills accessible for kids with 50 awesome activities. Whether you're planning kids' summer activities or looking for ways to keep the fun going all year round, this book is the perfect asset for your child.

This social skills book for kids is a great summer workbook for boosting skills between school years:

Life lessons—From learning about compromise to practicing good table manners, these activities help kids develop and use essential people skills.

50 interactive activities—Games, fill-in-the-blank exercises, and reflective prompts keep kids learning and engaged in a variety of ways.

Real scenarios—Kids will explore important topics like bullying, using social media, setting and respecting boundaries, and more.

Give children the confidence to successfully navigate social situations at home, school, and the world in between.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781641522960
Publisher:	Callisto Publishing
Publication date:	03/26/2019
Pages:	152
Product dimensions:	7.40(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.60(d)
Age Range:	6 - 10 Years

About the Author

NATASHA DANIELS is a child anxiety and OCD therapist, and a mom to three kids. She’s the author of How to Parent Your Anxious Toddler, Anxiety Sucks: A Teen Survival Guide, and Social Skills Activities for Kids. Natasha’s also the creator of ATParentingSurvival.com, the host of AT Parenting Survival Podcast, and the creator of the YouTube channel Ask the Child Therapist.

Table of Contents

Introduction For Parents x

Hello Friends xii

Chapter 1 What Are Social Skills (And Who Cares About Them, Anyway)? 1

Activity 1 Decode Your Social Skill Superpowers 2

Activity 2 Going Blindfolded 4

Activity 3 When to Use Your Superpowers 5

Activity 4 What's the Story? 7

Activity 5 My Superpower Score 11

Activity 6 What Holds Me Back? 14

Chapter 2 How To Talk To Anybody … And Everybody! 17

Activity 7 Conversation Starters 19

Activity 8 Goldilocks and the Three Questions 21

Activity 9 Throw It Back! 23

Activity 10 Keep the Conversation Ball Moving 25

Activity 11 Interruption Experiment 27

Activity 12 No One's the Boss of Us! 30

Activity 13 Spiderweb Talks 32

Activity 14 I'm Interested! Giving Body Language Clues 34

Activity 15 Time to Say Goodbye-Already'? 36

Chapter 3 Listen Up! 40

Activity 16 Body Bubbles 42

Activity 17 Practicing Patience 44

Activity 18 I Get It! 46

Activity 19 Are They Interested? Decoding Body Language Clues 48

Activity 20 The "Spreading Care" Experiment 51

Chapter 4 Making Friends 55

Activity 21 Word Salad 56

Activity 22 Reframing Thought Bubbles 58

Activity 23 Finding My Awesomeness in Threes 61

Activity 24 What Do I Tell Myself? 63

Activity 25 How Do Others See Me? 64

Activity 26 What Ingredients Are in a Friend? 66

Activity 27 Map It Out! 68

Activity 28 Dos and Don'ts for Making Friends 70

Activity 29 Double Dutch 72

Chapter 5 Keeping Friends 77

Activity 30 How Sensitive Am I? 78

Activity 31 Common Social Rules vs. Sensitive Rules 81

Activity 32 When Three's a Crowd 84

Activity 33 The Friend Playbook 85

Activity 34 Did You Hear? 88

Activity 35 Let's Compromise! 90

Activity 36 But We? re All Doing It! 93

Activity 37 What Do I Stand For? 96

Activity 38 To Tell or Not to Tell? 98

Chapter 6 In School And Out Of School 102

Activity 39 I Spy With My Little Eye 103

Activity 40 I Double Dare You! 105

Activity 41 Connect the Dots 107

Activity 42 Random Acts of Kindness 109

Activity 43 Who, What, When? 111

Chapter 7 At Home And In Other Homes 115

Activity 44 Sharing Experiment 116

Activity 45 The Should or Shouldn't Game 118

Activity 46 Privacy, Please! 121

Activity 47 I Aim to Impress! 123

Activity 48 Serving Up Good Table Manners 125

Activity 49 Can I Give You a Hand? 127

Activity 50 Collage of My New Talents 130

Resources 133

Index 134

Editorial Reviews

"One of Natasha's many talents is that she speaks Kid Language. In a friendly, easy-to-understand manner, her words motivate and encourage, normalize and educate. Social Skills Activities for Kids comprehensively addresses the many and varied tricky social situations that kids of all abilities and backgrounds encounter at home, at school, and in the community. Children will feel respected and supported by the caring warmth that jumps off the pages and the cheerful illustrations that will appeal to all ages. This is an excellent resource for families and for any therapist's toolkit."—Yael Clark, Educational and Developmental Psychologist

"I am thrilled that this book exists. As a clinical psychologist in private practice, I often see children that need some help learning and practicing social skills. I love this book because it allows me to give families a tool to practice on their own outside of therapy. It is full to the brim with lively, engaging, and effective activities and interventions for children and parents. Social skills are a part of a child's life that are often overlooked. Natasha beautifully integrates various techniques to address social skills deficits in the most important areas. These activities are wonderful ways for parents to learn how to better interact with their children based on their child's social competency. This is a MUST HAVE for kids, parents, and teachers."—Dr. Allison Solomon, Psy.D., PC, Director of the Virtual Center for Anxiety and OCD

"If your child struggles to make friends, misreads social cues, or has difficulty listening and making conversation, get a copy of Social Skills Activities for Kids today! Natasha Daniels has created a book of fun, interactive activities that kids can relate to. Most importantly, this book normalizes kids’ challenges and validates their feelings while helping them build important social skills."—Sharon Martin, LCSW, psychotherapist and author of The CBT Workbook for Perfectionism

"Natasha Daniels' Social Skills Activities for Kids is a warm, child- friendly compilation of activities to help elementary school children and caregivers master the essential skills for making and keeping friends. Natasha knows how to engage her young readers in this thorough, interactive, fun workbook that teaches important behaviors such as having manners, communicating at a friend's house, sharing, compromising, and more. In fact, this book is so useful, I am adapting the activities for teens and adults who struggle with social skills. This workbook offers useful strategies for teachers, parents, counselors, occupational therapists, and anyone else who wants to assist children in navigating the sometimes anxiety-provoking arena of successfully making and keeping friends, at any age."—Belinda Seiger, PhD, LCSW, Director, OCD & Anxiety Treatment Center of Princeton

From the Publisher