As children grow and develop, they explore the world around them through their senses: sight, smell, sound, taste, and touch.
Touch is an important way to explore and understand the environment around us. When we’re young, we can be taught not to touch hot things because we will get burned, which hurts!
We can also learn that when it’s very cold outside, we need to wear extra layers of protection to cover up from the elements.
Using Social Stories
Social stories are a versatile tool to teach your students and children about appropriate ways to use touch to explore their environment safely.
Not only are they effective for safe environmental exploration, but also for teaching appropriate social interactions revolving around touch as well.
For example, students with autism may not always recognize social cues in a given peer setting. Perhaps they like to give hugs to their friends when they see them, but they have missed the body language of their peer who is uncomfortable being hugged.
A social story is an effective tool to help students understand how to pick up on social cues from their peers and learn when it is appropriate to hug someone and when it may not be wanted by the other party. Perhaps they would prefer a high five or a fist bump instead!
Check out the set of social story templates our consultants have prepared on a variety of subjects regarding touch, or create your own to help your students better understand their environments and the people within them.
The special education resources on this page were authored by Watson Institute’s special education consultant, Andee Morris, M.Ed.
These social stories may benefit your students. They can be downloaded, saved and edited to suit your needs. The * notation indicates the story is formatted in a Power Point presentation and the ** notation indicates a Power Point with sound narration. Each Power Point has animation included on each slide. Some occur automatically – some occur on a “click”. Feel free to send comments or questions to [email protected].
Touching Other People’s Things
My Hands Are Not For Hot Objects
All About Hugging and Touching
All About Hugging and Touching*
All About Hugging and Touching**
Fact Sheet: Germs and Your Health
If you have questions or concerns about the Watson Institute’s use of this information, please contact us.