The New Social Story Book, Revised and Expanded 15th Anniversary Edition. Carol Gray

       5. Accurate meaning.

      DISCUSSION

      The 4^th Criterion tailors Story format to the Audience. The 5^th Criterion gives additional detail and picks up where the 4^th Criterion leaves off with five factors to define Story voice and vocabulary. Working together, these factors result in the characteristic safe, patient and reassuring quality that distinguish Social Stories^™ from social scripts and other similar visual strategies.

      1. FIRST- OR THIRD-PERSON PERSPECTIVE STATEMENTS

      Selecting an effective perspective from which to share the information in a Social Story^™ is important, and pre-requisite to placing any words on paper. A few factors impact this decision and ultimately determine the Story’s voice.

      Many Social Stories^™ are written in a first person voice, as though the Audience is describing the situation, event, or concept. Writing from this perspective, a Story will often contain both first and third person sentences. Presenting information from an Audience vantage point increases Author responsibility. Authors take extra care to make sure that they do not “put words into the mouth” of the Audience, or presume to make an uninformed guess regarding the Audience perspective of the situation. For example, statements like, “I will like eating lunch at recess,” are presumptuous, potentially inaccurate, and unsuitable for placement in a Social Story^™.