Kids Awareness Series

Social skills or lack thereof, is a key element of the diagnosis of Asperger’s Disorder.  Children struggle with understanding the ebb and flow of conversation and developing relationships are often a struggle and very painful for children.  Here are a few simple tried and true ways for a child to start a conversation:

1. “Hey”, “How are you doing?”, “What’s up?”, -something simple to get the conversation going.  Even adults have to do this
2. “How was your weekend?”,  “Did you do anything or go anywhere?”
3. “What did you watch on TV last night” or “Have you seen any good movies?”

Discussions with adults are a little trickier, but should start with something like, “Hi, Mr. Williams, how are you?”

Yes, these sound very simple, however starting and ending a conversation for an Asperger’s child is not that simple, so we have to start with something simple and work our way up slowly.  To end a conversation, it should be just as easy.  Some things that your child can say, which should be rehearsed with you the parent at home before they try them at school could be:

1. “I have to get to class, so I will see you later”
2. “I gotta go and get some homework done”
3. “I have to catch the bus now”   

Other things to start and end a conversation can be added to this list and whatever is on the list should be age appropriate.  By rehearsing these starting and endings to a conversation, your Asperger’s child will feel alot less anxiety when they are faced with social interactions with their peers. A very good idea would also be to develop social starters and endings that your child can use in any situation such as at school, with adults, when out in public, ie… the grocery store.

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