Give Me 5!!!!! Social Skills

Give Me 5 is a social skills learning App. It helps children learn about eight different sub-domains of social skills by answering questions about social situations seen in short video clips. The beautiful children in these videos are not actors, and represent kids with diverse abilities, some of whom are on the autism spectrum.

These videos demonstrate everyday scenarios that the children can relate to. It is meant to help children analyze social situations by looking for key social cues in these scenarios. The rewind and replay buttons allow for reviewing situations for concentration or enjoyment. Also, “bystander learning” takes away the anxiety components which may interfere in real time social contexts. This makes it easier for the child to gain the tools necessary for social success by learning the nuances of social interactions. Once understood, it may be more easily generalized to real life social situations.

Give Me 5 is presented in a way that encourages engagement and makes it fun to learn. Children can pick a virtual “friend” to play with, take a picture of themselves, and record their own voices saying “Give Me 5” or other words of self encouragement. The virtual “friend” can help a child to pick the social skills categories seen in the videos by dropping a colorful spinning disk into a pachinko like maze. Children can have fun guiding the disk, and trying to get it into any color they like. Right answers are celebrated and are followed by an explanation, giving children a deeper social understanding. Wrong answers are followed by an encouraging, “Almost, let’s look at this one again” and the video is cycled back into the category. Fireworks signal a job well done when “Give Me 5s” from all 8 categories are achieved. This allows the child to “Level Up” giving the child a sense of accomplishment as well as a well rounded understanding of social skills.

There are five videos for each of these eight categories:
-Manners
-Words
-No Words
-Understanding Others
-Understanding Me
-Calming Feelings
-People and Places
-Big Picture

Parents, educators or therapists can monitor the game results to gain valuable insight into each childs strengths and areas requiring further development.