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Social Skills Groups

Our clinic is located at 250 Carlaw Ave., Unit 102, in the Leslieville area of Toronto.

We offer several evidence-based social skills groups for children and youth at Launch Behavioural Services. All groups are offered in-person at our clinic.

Youth Social Skills Group (ages 12-17)

Spring 2022 In-Person Group

  • April 13th until July 13th (14 weeks)
  • Wednesdays 5:00-6:30 pm, in-person at Launch clinic
  • Weekly parent meetings via Zoom
  • Intakes required

We offer social skills groups based on the PEERS®(Program for the Education and Enrichment of Relational Skills) Curriculum (Laugeson, 2014) for adolescents. PEERS® is an evidence-based friendship training program for middle school and high school students who are diagnosed with ASD or related disabilities and have primarily difficulties with making and keeping friends. During weekly sessions, skills are taught in an online small-group lesson format with opportunities to practice with the peers in the group.

An eligibility assessment, including an interview with your teen, will be conducted in order to determine if your teen meets the pre-requisite criteria to join the social skills group. This assessment is essential to identify if your child displays the prerequisite skills to learn within a group setting. Your child should also display motivation to learn the skills for making and keeping friends.

The sessions will be conducted in a small group format with 1 lead instructor and 1 assistant instructor. 

The goals of the program include:

  • Trading information
  • Conversational skills
  • Electronic communication
  • Choosing appropriate friends
  • Appropriate use of humor
  • Peer entry and exit strategies
  • Get-togethers
  • Good sportsmanship
  • Handling teasing, bullying, and bad reputation
  • Handling arguments and disagreements
  • Handling rumours and gossip

What we offer:

  • One 60-minute sessions weekly, for 14 sessions
  • Parent meetings via ZoomHealth
  • Curriculum based learning plan
  • Opportunities to connect and interact with all youth within the program
  • Supervision from a BCBA, BCBA-D, or Registered Psychologist

Commitment from parents:

  • Attendance at parent group meetings
  • Participation in homework or parent training opportunities
  • Provide coaching in socialization opportunities during the week
  • Ongoing communication about challenges, concerns or progress

Other Groups

Starting March 21st until May 16th (8 weeks)

We offer social skills groups for children ages 4-7 using evidence-based strategies including Teaching Interaction Procedure (Taubman, Leaf, & McEachin, 2011). Our goal is to teach your child how to apply skills learned within the group, with peers at school, and in the community. Skills will be taught in small group format and 1 lead instructor and an assistant instructor.

An intake screening is required to determine if your child currently has the pre-requisite skills to learn within a group setting. 

 

Our children social skills group address social functioning in several areas:

  • Initiating social contact and interaction

  • Play: reciprocity and flow

  • Comments during play

  • Having a conversation

  • Giving compliments

  • Apologizing 

  • And more!
 

What we offer:

  • One 60-minute session per week, after school for 8 sessions
  • Evidence-based procedures
  • Opportunities to connect and interact with all children within the program
  • Supervision from a BCBA, BCBA-D, or Registered Psychologist 
 

Commitment from parents:

  • Ongoing communication about challenges, concerns or progress
  • Weekly attendance and participation in parent meetings the last 10-minutes of each session, to share information and homework assignment

Starting March 22nd until June 7th (12 weeks)

We offer social skills groups based on the Children Friendship Training program (Frankle & Myatt, 2003) for children ages 8-12. Our goal is to teach your child how to apply skills learned within the group, with peers at school, and in the community. Skills will be taught in an online small-group format with 6-8 children and 1 lead instructor and an assistant instructor.

An eligibility assessment will be conducted in order to determine if your child meets the pre-requisite criteria to join the social skills group. This assessment is essential to identify if your child displays the prerequisite skills to learn within a group setting.

 

Our children social skills group address social functioning in several areas:

  • Conversational skills
  • Peer group entry
  • Expanding and developing friendship networks
  • Handling teasing
  • Practicing good sportsmanship
  • Practicing good host behaviour during playdates
 

What we offer:

  • One 60-minute session per week, for 12 sessions
  • Parent meetings via ZoomHealth
  • Curriculum based learning plan
  • Opportunities to connect and interact with all children within the program
  • Supervision from a BCBA, BCBA-D, or Registered Psychologist
 

Commitment from parents:

  • Participation in homework or parent training opportunities
  • Attendance at parent group meetings
  • Ongoing communication about challenges, concerns or progress

Contact Us to Register or to Learn More


Dalton Associates (DA) and Launch Behavioural Health acknowledge that we are situated on Turtle Island, that has been inhabited by Indigenous Peoples from the beginning. As a settler-owned organization, we are always working on de-colonizing our practices and offering mental health services that reflect a wholistic approach to health and wellness. Our clients come from a variety of backgrounds, and include First Nations, Métis, and Inuit peoples. We want to do more than make a difference at an individual level: we aspire to support a societal shift in the way that mental health is addressed and cared for, and we believe that a cross-cultural approach, bringing Indigenous worldviews to the forefront, is necessary to help break the system and rebuild it in a way that promotes healthy wellbeing for future generations. We are actively engaged in changing the landscape of mental health care in Ontario, by augmenting (and compensating) the voices and experiences of Indigenous knowledge keepers, and by incorporating Indigenous values and teachings in our program models.