Summer - A great chance to enhance social skills

By Angela Rudderham, Director of Turning Tides Community Outreach

Social skills are learned behaviours. Having a learning disability or ADHD can affect the acquisition of these skills.  These skills may have to be broken down to their finest point and taught. These skills must also be practised and evaluated. Many parents fear that with summer approaching, and students going off in different directions, their child may not have many opportunities to practise their social skills. No need to worry, there are plenty of opportunities to get involved, learn and practise social skills over the summer months. For example, parents can help their child organize a get together.

If your child struggles socially the following tips should help things run smoothly.


• Always provide plenty of structure.
• Help your child plan an activity that their guests will enjoy.
• Talk to your child about how the get together will go, this will help lessen anxiety.
• Make sure they have one or two back up plans.
• Talk to them after their friends have left and provide kind and honest feedback with explicit details regarding their actions or conversations. 
Keep in mind those activities outside of the house where another adult is in charge, such as a cooking lesson or a rock climbing lesson, often supplies the right amount of structure and can take the pressure off the host. The activity should allow your child’s best attributes to shine. If they have a difficult time following direction then a cooking lesson may not be their thing. If they have difficulty handling disappointment then you’ll want to steer clear of anything too competitive until those coping skills are in place.

You may want to check out day camps that provide the opportunity to explore an interest and practise social skills. If you are worried that your child’s social needs may contribute to a negative experience there are a few questions that will aide you in choosing the right fit.


• What are your child’s interests?
• How does his/her learning needs contribute to his/her social needs? For example, is he/she impulsive or lack emotional control? Perhaps there is difficulty reading non-verbal cues.
• What do you want your child to gain from his/her experience?
• What does your child want to gain from their experience?
• Does he/she need structure?
• Does he/she become overwhelmed in a face paced environment or do they become bored if things move too slowly?

After considering your child there are a few questions you should seek answers to when looking for the right day camp experience.


• What is the ratio of counsellors to campers?
• How are the counsellors trained? What experience do they have with children who have similar social or learning needs?
• Can they send you a schedule of activities? How much unstructured time is on the schedule?
• How will they encourage harmony within the group?
You may consider a day program that will aide in the development of social skills while creating a fun experience. Turning Tides Community Outreach program delivers a social skills summer day camp for school aged children. The day camp directly teaches social skills and offers opportunities for practise through fun activities and feedback. If you would like more information regarding our social skills summer day camp please call (902) 404-TIDE (8433).

How does a learning disability affect the parents of a child?

By Angela Rudderham, Director of Turning Tides Community Outreach

Research indicates that parental reaction to the diagnosis of learning disability is more pronounced than in any other area of exceptionality. Consider: if a child is mentally or physically handicapped, the parent becomes aware of the problem in the first few weeks of the child's life. However, the pre-school development of the learning disabled child is often uneventful and the parent does not suspect that a problem exists. When informed of the problem by elementary school personnel, a parent's first reaction is generally to deny the existence of a disability. This denial is, of course, unproductive. The father tends to remain in this stage for a prolonged period because he is not exposed to the child's day-to-day frustrations and failures.

Research conducted by Eleanor Whitehead suggests that the parent of an LD child goes through a series of emotions before truly accepting the child and his problem. These "stages" are totally unpredictable. A parent may move from stage-to-stage in random. Some parents skip over stages while others remain in one stage for an extended period. These stages are as follows:

DENIAL: "There is really nothing wrong!" "That's the way I was as a child--not to worry!" "He'll grow out of it!"

BLAME: "You baby him!" "You expect too much of him." "It's not from my side of the family."

FEAR: "Maybe they're not telling me the real problem!" "Is it worse than they say?" "Will he ever marry? go to college? graduate?"

ENVY: "Why can't he be like his sister or his cousins?"

MOURNING: "He could have been such a success, if not for the learning disability!"

BARGAINING: "Wait 'till next year!" "Maybe the problem will improve if we move! (or he goes to camp, etc.)."

ANGER: "The teachers don't know anything." "I hate this neighborhood, this school...this teacher."

GUILT: "My mother was right; I should have used cloth diapers when he was a baby." "I shouldn't have worked during his first year." "I am being punished for something and my child is suffering as a result."

ISOLATION: "Nobody else knows or cares about my child." "You and I against the world. No one else understands."

FLIGHT: "Let's try this new therapy--Donahue says it works!" "We are going to go from clinic to clinic until somebody tells me what I want to hear.!"

Again, the pattern of these reactions is totally unpredictable. This situation is worsened by the fact that frequently the mother and father may be involved in different and conflicting stages at the same time (e.g., blame vs. denial; anger vs. guilt). This can make communication very difficult.

The good news is that with proper help, most LD children can make excellent progress. There are many successful adults such as attorneys, business executives, physicians, teachers, etc. who had learning disabilities but overcame them and became successful. Now with special education and many special materials, LD children can be helped early.

Pointers for parents of children with learning disabilities:

1.   Take the time to listen to your children as much as you can (really try to get their "Message").

2.   Love them by touching them, hugging them, tickling them, wrestling with them (they need lots of physical contact).

3.   Look for and encourage their strengths, interests, and abilities. Help them to use these as compensations for any limitations or disabilities.

4.   Reward them with praise, good words, smiles, and pat on the back as often as you can.

5.   Accept them for what they are and for their human potential for growth and development. Be realistic in your expectations and demands.

6.   Involve them in establishing rules and regulations, schedules, and family activities.

7.   Tell them when they misbehave and explain how you feel about their behavior; then have them propose other more acceptable ways of behaving.

8.   Help them to correct their errors and mistakes by showing or demonstrating what they should do.

9.   Don't nag!

10.  Give them reasonable chores and a regular family work responsibility whenever possible.

11.  Give them an allowance as early as possible and then help them plan to spend within it.

12.  Provide toys, games, motor activities and opportunities that will stimulate them in their development.

13.  Read enjoyable stories to them and with them. Encourage them to ask questions, discuss stories, tell the story, and to reread stories.

14.  Further their ability to concentrate by reducing distracting aspects of their environment as much as possible (provide them with a place to work, study and play).

15.  Don't get hung up on traditional school grades! It is important that they progress at their own rates and be rewarded for doing so.

16.  Take them to libraries and encourage them to select and check out books of interest.

17.  Have them share their books with you.

18.  Provide stimulating books and reading material around the house.

19.  Help them to develop self-esteem and to compete with self rather than with others.

20.  Insist that they cooperate socially by playing, helping, and serving others in the family and the community.

21.  Serve as a model to them by reading and discussing material of personal interest. Share with them some of the things you are reading and doing.

22.  Don't hesitate to consult with teachers or other specialists whenever you feel it to be necessary in order to better understand what might be done to help your child learn.

Angela is a behaviour and social skills specialist who has developed programs for students, as well as support workshops for parents, teachers and other professionals. For more information or advice, please give Angela a call at 902-404-TIDE (8433).

A mental health toolkit for parents

As a parent, we all want to do what we can to help our kids.  Here are a few tips for keeping your kids mentally healthy from the Calgary Herald series.

What can parents do to help keep their children and youth mentally healthy? Jodie Cossette, a recreation therapist with the Eating Disorders Clinic at Alberta Children’s Hospital offers these tips:

• Find the balance between work and play. Work, school, being productive and goal-oriented are important, but so is making time to rest, rejuvenate and recharge.

• Play together as a family — and not just at sports. It can be board games, goofing around in a park, hanging out with friends and family. Have fun, keep it lighthearted.

• Aim for a healthy, balanced lifestyle on a budget. “It doesn’t have to be Hawaii for three weeks. Entertainment can be very simple, like a game of charades. Finances don’t have to be a barrier. Get back to the basics”

• Find a passion. “Life can be very difficult, demanding and stressful, whether you’re working or going to school, whether you’re a child, adolescent or adult. Having an outlet, an activity, a hobby can help restore, help heal and distract us from the difficulties — not to avoid them but to take a break from them.”

• Humour is vital. Laughter helps us breathe, let go of tension and look at life from a different perspective. “We need to be able to laugh at ourselves, knowing that we as human beings are not perfect; we are incredibly flawed. Look at the lighter side of life. Be playful.

“We cannot laugh and play all day because that’s not healthy either. Again, it’s finding the balance.”


Read more: http://www.calgaryherald.com/mental+health+toolkit+parents/5523751/story.html#ixzz1aQLk5Cs4