By James Feichtner
Zionsville’s town library recently received several new additions to its shelves. Thanks to the continuous efforts of local speech pathologists and Zionsville school employees Paige Stuckey and Randee Kleeman, Hussey Mayfield Public Library received more than one dozen donated books that teach Social Thinking® concepts. Pamela Crooke and Michelle G. Winner, founders of social thinking, donated the books.
Kleeman and Stuckey have been implementing these “social thinking concepts” locally on both personal and professional levels. While their methods are primarily focused on educating children in ZCS schools, they also privately educate families on the concepts of social thinking. Their work has not only had students realizing a positive impact, but parents as well.
“With parents too, they’re seeing the success. They’re finally able to understand their child more and they’re able to finally get them to think about each other, and so they’re having more conversations together, Stuckey said.”
Recently Kleeman and Stuckey were selectively chosen to attend an exclusive Social Thinking Clinical Training Program in San Jose, CA. While Paige and Stuckey have experience in the field, the program helped reinforce their understanding of social thinking.
“It helped validate what Randee and I had already implemented here at Zionsville, because it’s a work in progress. Not a lot of people are using it. We started just by reading it ourselves and we hadn’t even been to a conference, and then it just snowballed,” Stuckey said.
Both Paige and Randee are actively trying to spread the word on the benefits of social thinking education throughout the community.
“We volunteer to speak, we have a Zionsville Autism parent support group, and so I volunteer to speak there. Paige has volunteered to speak at some area pre-schools. We’re just willing to do anything to get the word out,” Kleeman said. “The community has really embraced it.”
The books are intended for a variety of ages and are a great resource for students, parents and educators alike.
