Today, Sarah, Kathy, Calee and I videotaped the preparation story that we prepared in yesterday's class. Our social story was designed for a fictitious student, "David", who was a grade 7 student who was cognitively delayed and experienced short term memory issues. He benefited from frequent repeat instruction and prompting. He used an iPod Touch for checklists. David used checklists to improve organizational skills and routines. His strengths included social interactions with adults, technology use and making connections to topics of interest (i.e. boating).
The social story we put together was designed to help David get prepared independently for class each morning and help him to arrive in his homeroom before O Canada played. Instructions in the video included the following:
1. When I come to school in the morning I will go directly to my locker and hang up my coat.
2. I will look at my checklist to see what I need for the morning.
3. I will put my iPod Touch around my neck.
4. I will pick up my binder, my pencil case and my water bottle.
5. I will lock my locker.
6. I will go directly to my homeroom so my teacher will know that I am here.
7. This will make my teacher happy and make me happy too.
The video we shot included scenes of David (played by Kathy) walking to his locker. Since we had no available lockers to use, Sarah drew a life size creative version of a locker. In the video David hangs up his coat, puts on his iPod Touch and checks his task list to remember to collect his binder, pencil case and water bottle. He then closes his locker and walks to class to meet his teacher. This video was created using iMovies and was it was quick to shoot the video on an iPod Nano and upload it to the computer where it was converted from mP4 video to .mov in Prism Video Converter and imported to iMovie. The challenging and creative side of this endeavor was in editing the scenes and adding text boxes and credits. At one point near the end of production we actually thought we had lost the entire project but with some ingenious searching on Sarah's part we recovered everything. WHEW! It was fun to exert our creative energies and produce such a polished piece in an hour or so.
The benefits of this social story to our fictitious David would probably be huge. I think it would greatly reduce the anxiety and worry of a student who had cognitive delays and short term memory issues. Through frequent viewings of this video, David would feel more at ease and be more comfortable doing his morning routine, remembering his school supplies and getting to class on time.
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