Social Stories for Social Emotional Learning

Activity Overview

Social stories are individualized short stories about a social situation that children may encounter at any time. They use words and/or images to explain interactions, behaviors, and social skills. Social stories should be brief and use positive language, avoiding words such as “don’t”, “can’t”, and “won’t”. For this activity, teachers will read aloud the social story below, choose a different one to share, or have students write their own. Next, students will create a 4-6 cell storyboard that illustrates each part of the story.

Example social story: I love to run when I play outside. It makes me feel good. Sometimes I want to run inside the school, but it is dangerous. I want to keep myself and others safe, so I walk when I am inside. My teacher is happy that I am walking in the building, and that makes me feel good.

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Template and Class Instructions

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Due Date:

Objective: Create a storyboard that tells and illustrates a social story.

Student Instructions

Click “Start Assignment”.
Write the parts of the social story in the description boxes.
In each cell, create an illustration that represents the part of the social story using appropriate characters, scenes, and items.

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Lesson Plan Reference

Grade Level 3-4

Difficulty Level 2 (Reinforcing / Developing)

Type of Assignment Individual

Type of Activity: Introduction To Social Stories

Common Core Standards

[ELA-Literacy/SL/1/1] Participate in collaborative conversations with diverse partners about grade 1 topics and texts with peers and adults in small and larger groups.
[ELA-Literacy/SL/2/2] Recount or describe key ideas or details from a text read aloud or information presented orally or through other media.
[ELA-Literacy/SL/4/1] Engage effectively in a range of collaborative discussions (one-on-one, in groups, and teacher-led) with diverse partners on grade 4 topics and texts, building on others' ideas and expressing their own clearly.

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Rubric

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Rubric

	Proficient 5 Points	Emerging 3 Points	Beginning 1 Points
Explanation	The descriptions are clear and at least two sentences.	The descriptions can be understood but it are somewhat unclear.	The descriptions are unclear and are not at least two sentences.
Illustrations	The illustrations represent the descriptions using appropriate scenes, characters and items.	The illustrations relate to the descriptions, but are difficult to understand.	The illustrations do not clearly relate to the descriptions.
Evidence of Effort	Work is well written and carefully thought out.	Work shows some evidence of effort.	Work shows little evidence of any effort.
Conventions	Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are mostly correct.	Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are somewhat correct.	Spelling, grammar, and punctuation are mostly incorrect.