Social Stories for Kids in Conflict

"I saw John developing the ideas from this book from 2002 onwards as a consequence of his work with autistic children, especially children with Asperger's Syndrome, and especially with children who were experiencing difficulties in the classroom. He was looking for an efficient medium, a simple message and he wanted to make his advice readily available to a wide audience.

I met a child (I work as an educational psychologist) who was 10 years of age and saw the undiagnosed signs of Asperger Syndrome. I recommended to her teacher and support assistant John's book as an obvious way of dealing with minor but repeating behaviour incidents. The support assistant told me some months later that John's book was an ideal resource.

He gets straight down to his unique rendition of social stories applicable not only to autistic children but to any child who needs to be shown how to improve their behaviour – he made it applicable to the routines of the school day – this edition keeps the valuable cartoons and visual techniques – he provides a theoretical context for those who want to read it.

Social Stories for Kids in Conflict, 2nd Edition is not intended to be a statement of theory or an instrument of research – it is a practical resource intended for the person who needs it. It is ideal for the special needs teacher, the class teacher, the support assistant and for the parent of a child who needs the benefit of a social stories approach. It shows the adult who works with the child what to do in difficult situations during the school day. The approach of social stories also works in the home context, so some parents would find the book helpful. This book provides the adult with the concepts and scripts to use directly with the child.

I think the social stories approach could be aimed at a far wider child audience than autistic children and kids in conflict. The current target children have an intrinsic barrier to learning all the expected social skills. But I think it would work also for children who have a functional barrier, such as not being able to speak English well, being a recent immigrant to Britain or being for any reason confused, angry or in conflict, such that normal, expected patterns of behaviour in school are prevented. The second improvement would be that I would like to see the book help the support assistant write their own social stories that would then be even more applicable to the children they work with." - Peter Forde, Educational Psychologist, B.Sc., Dip. Ed., M.A., M.Sc., DEd

"This is a fantastic, hands on guide for all people living or working with young people who are in conflict, and particularly relevant to young people who are on the autistic spectrum. The introductions are clear and provide valuable context. The examples, which are simply but well illustrated, provide extremely helpful guides to tackling some of the difficult issues that all kids in conflict face. I can see my staff using this to further support out students, whether they are in conflict or not. This will definitely be a must have book for my school". - Geoff Brookes, Headmaster, Breckenbrough School

"A must have for enabling all young children to access storytelling. This is such an inclusive approach it is adaptable for all abilities." - Stephen Parsons (Speech Language Therapy Team Manager at City and Hackney Teaching PCT and author) and Anna Branagan (Clinical Lead Specialist Speech and Language Therapist at City and Hackney Teaching PCT and author)