Learning Prep School is pleased to continue our partnership with Elsa Abele. Elsa is a renowned educational consultant who recently retired from Boston University, where she was a Clinical Professor of Communication Disorders; she also had a private practice under the umbrella of Boston University’s Rehabilitation Services at Sargent College. Currently she is involved with training and consulting to families, school systems, and service agencies for children and adults who have social communication disorders.

For most of us, the language of social interaction is learned so naturally that it seems intuitive. For others, though, social and communication skills need to be explicitly taught. Although these persons can have learned language and can use it – such as putting sentences together and selecting the appropriate vocabulary – these people can still find it difficult to figure out how to use language to interact with others. These skills can be taught and practiced in a step-by-step manner. Research has shown that the skills of social interaction are among the most important for school and job success as well as personal satisfaction.

Because social skills are so critical to success on many levels, Learning Prep has made a commitment to infuse its curriculum with explicit teaching strategies and the practice necessary for skill development in social communication. Since 2003, Elsa has led workshops for LPS staff and parents to provide them with the training they need to understand social skills development. In past presentations, she has explained the profile of student who have social communication deficits; what particular academic, emotional, and social challenges they may face; and how to accommodate these students in the classroom or home environment. The conversational hierarchy – the foundation of communication between people, i.e., the main elements of any conversation – has also been outlined and strategies have been presented to facilitate better interaction. She has stressed that social and communication skills need to be explicitly taught for these students, as they have difficulty figuring out how to use language to interact with others. These skills will never become automatic for people with social communication deficits, but oftentimes they can be acquired and integrated to a degree that will enable some successful communications to take place. Elsa has stated that these skills of communication and social interaction should be explained and practiced in a step-by-step manner; and they are particularly effective when the skills are taught and reinforced across the curriculum and at home.

We will continue to focus on infusing our curriculum with explicit teaching strategies and the practice necessary for skill development in social communication. The scope of our work includes providing at-home strategies for parents that reinforce lessons introduced in the classroom. In addition, our after-school programming incorporates social pragmatics in a more relaxed, playful environment.We look forward to another year of working with Elsa and integrating social skills into all learning that takes place at Learning Prep.