Making Friends Made Easier

For many students with special needs, the process of making and maintaining social relationships is not as innate and may come with some confusion. At Port View Preparatory®, our goal is to smooth those transitional bumps with special care and attention through our practical social skills training program. Many students with disabilities demonstrate a strong desire to interact with others and make friends but struggle with reading nonverbal cues and engaging in social interactions. Certain individuals are more likely than their peers to have difficulty with these interactions including:

• Students with Autism Spectrum Disorders and/or developmental delays
• Students with learning disabilities (LD), particularly those with nonverbal learning disabilities
• Students with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
• Students with Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD)
• Students with Pervasive Developmental Disorders (PDD)

For students who display varying degrees of difficulty socializing, instruction and practice is necessary and beneficial. Port View Preparatory® teachers and therapists work closely with parents and caregivers to ensure the proper course of social guidance is integrated into their students individualized behavior plan. Our team conducts social skills training both on campus and in community settings. Field trips and outings are a large part of our social skills training program because they provide students with opportunities to interact with the wider world beyond our campus and/or their immediate families. Our hope is that every student develops the skills needed to fulfill their own social goals and desires.

There are countless benefits to social skills training and the perceptiveness of students enrolled generally increases dramatically as they progress through the program*.

*Individual results vary.