updated 9/2024
Do you use youtube for social skills instruction? Do you incorporate social skills videos into your speech therapy sessions? Whether you see students in person or online, youtube is a great option for working on social skills. I had a second grader last week who whispered (loudly) “my speech teacher is letting me watch youtube” to his older sibling during teletherapy. “Surprise,” I told him, “youtube has educational videos too!” Let’s chat about why youtube and other social skills videos are so awesome for social skills and speech therapy!
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Why YouTube for social skills?
YouTube for social skills and social skills videos from other sources are the way to go for these reasons:
- Engaging Material: YouTube is new, fun, slick, and interactive. Since many of them watch youtube for fun outside of school, students almost feel like they are breaking some type of school rule when they watch it!
- Authenticity: Worksheets and pictures are static. The component of movement and fluidity in videos lets students practice processing social information as it happens! It’s the next best thing to real life situations!
- Pause and Rewind or Review: Kids can freeze the social interaction to really look at how the faces changed, identify the facial expressions or consider the feelings of the person in the video.
- Safely Explore Social Mistakes: Watching social skills videos can help a child identify a character’s social mistakes and victories without focusing on their own challenges and that can be a safe place to start for many chiildren. Talking about characters can help build a comfort level for kids over time and strengthen their ability to self-reflect on their own social challenges.
How to View youtube videos safely
Here are a few things to try when you wants to purify youtube videos from ads. Safety first when using youtube for social skills, right?
- Viewpure: Currently viewpure is free. You can purify your video before your students view it in therapy or you assign it for homework. All you do is add the youtube url to the search box and click the “purify” button. Viewpure is used to:
- Removing inappropriate ads and comments from videos to show kids
- Removing unwanted related videos at the end to show students
2. If you or your district springs for youtube premium, you can watch ad-free when signed into your paid account.
3. You can also check out vimeo which is paid but ad-free.
Subscribe to your favorite channels!
Are there certain videos you use all the time in speech therapy? Hit that red subscribe button so you don’t miss out on new content from your favorite youtube creators.
Tech Tip: use a split screen during teletherapy!
When you are using a youtube video with an accompanying activity during teletherapy, a split screen really comes in handy! You can have one screen open to the youtube video and the other screen open to the activity, allowing your students to move from the video to the activity with ease. Not sure how to do a split screen? Check out the video below on how to do it on a mac.
Do you use a PC?
Here’s a tutorial I found on how to do a split screen on Windows 10.
Make YouTube Playlists!
Did you know that there is a feature now where you can create your own playlists? It’s awesome! You don’t have to bookmark your favorites anymore-you can make a playlist just like you do with your music! I have playlists for a variety of different skills so when I’m planning for speech therapy sessions or looking for a video on the fly, I can check out my playlists for that particular skill! I don’t make excel lists of social skills videos-I find it easier to make playlists on youtube!
Check out my “go-to” playlists!
Check out my favorite playlist on videos for conversation skills! I have a number of other playlists too, many for social skills or other skills I teach during speech therapy sessions.
Are you wondering how to create a playlist? Check out these steps from the youtube site!
Short Films, Wordless Animations:
I don’t have one certain channel I like for short films. Here are a few of my favorite animated, wordless short films:
- Lifted by Pixar: A young alien tries to abduct a human and makes some mistakes along the way! Great for perspective-taking, size of the problem and problem-solving.
- Like an Elephant in a China Shop: An elephant enters a china shop and mayhem ensues….or does it? A great wordless animation for perspective-taking, making inferences and identifying emotions and character traits. I have an accompanying activity packet in my TPT store here!
- Geri’s Game: In this wordless short, an elderly man plays chess against himself as if he was wo people. Great for making inferences about emotions, discussing inattention and perspective-taking.
- The Present: A touching animated film about a boy who prefers playing video games until his mother gives him something special! Great for perspective-taking, making inferences, talking about disabilities and identifying emotions. I have an accompanying tiered activity packet to this film here: Social skills activity to accomany “the present.”
Youtube Companion Activities
It’s nice to have structured activities to accompany your video clips! I have two bundles in my TPT store that accompany youtube clips.
Let’s Talk: Social Communication
This bundle contains 4 products that teach a different area of social communication: identification of emotions, sarcasm and tone of voice, personal space and conversation skills. Each item in the bundle is sold separately. The products contain narrated social narratives to teach the skills, clips to relevant youtube videos and accompanying activities. The youtube clips and activities make for great social skills activities for middle and high school students.
2. Youtube Video Companion
This bundle accompanies four youtube clips. Initial activities in the packet are time-stamped with a question to ask at each point in time in the video clip! The packets address areas of social communication, perspective-taking, making inferences and predictions and language activities. Each product contains data collection forms with fillable text boxes!
I have tones of freebies for speech therapy that you’ll have access to when you join my newsletter?
Let me help you plan your social skills interventions!
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