Going to Church Social Story

A first-person social story previews the sequence of a church service, from sitting on a pew through singing, prayer, Sunday school and a positive-behaviour close.

Year groups: Not year specific
Pages: 19
File type: PDF
Preparation: Print ready

Updated Jan 13, 2024

Subject: Special Education Needs (SEN), Life Skills, Special Resources
Topic: Social Story, Autism
Preparation: Print ready

From the author

About this resource

Social stories use a patient and reassuring tone to teach children about social situations in a way that can be easily understood. Social stories are particularly useful for children on the autistic spectrum for whom social cues can be challenging and who often suffer anxiety if they do not know what to expect from a situation however social stories can also be useful for any child who is struggling to understand a situation or concept or needs help to understand a social skill or social cue, expectations, perspectives, common responses or is troubled about an upcoming event.

A social story about what you might expect when you go to a Christian church on Sunday. It covers sitting in pews, listening, singing songs and going to Sunday school.. This is designed to ease some anxiety before going out to church to help the child know what they should expect and how they should try to behave while they are there.

These books should be used over and over to reinforce the point so I would suggest either putting the pages into a display book or laminating and binding them.

Included is a 19 page PDF printable social story.

Clipart images courtesy of Kari Bolt.

In the classroom

Teaching tips & learning objectives

Learning objectives

Anticipate the sequence of events in a typical church service, from arrival through Sunday school and departure.
Identify expected behaviours during specific parts of the service, such as sitting quietly, listening, and singing along.
Recognize that positive, quiet behaviour at church leads to positive feedback from familiar adults.

Teaching tips

Choose and print just one of the five 'who speaks at the front' pages (minister, vicar, priest, pastor, or preacher) to match the student's own congregation, rather than the whole set.
Read through the story with the student before an actual church visit so each step is familiar in advance.
Use the final two pages, praise for good behaviour and liking church, as a positive close-out discussion after an actual visit.

Skills covered

Sequential event anticipation — students preview the order of a church service from arrival to departure.
Social-behaviour expectation setting — students learn specific expected behaviours, such as sitting quietly, listening and singing along, for each part of the service.

Good to know

Questions teachers ask about this resource

Why does the story repeat the same page five times with a different title?

Each of the five nearly identical pages swaps in a different term for the person who speaks at the front, minister, vicar, priest, pastor, or preacher, so you can select and print just the one matching your own church's terminology.