This practical book outlines the underlying theories, approach and session content to run the Imagine, Create, Belong program. This book focusses on older children and young adolescents aged 11 to 15 years who are neuro-diverse, for example, adolescents with a diagnois of autism, ADHD, learning difficulties. The age group can be extended to 18 years for adolescents with additional needs. Included in the book are 16 sessions for adolescents with additional needs.

Adolescents who are neuro-diverse often find social situations confusing. The Imagine, Create, Belong program recognises that underpinning abilities in pretend play are important to understanding complex social situations. Social pretend play requires children to understand the context of play, the narrative of the play, to understand the implied meaning in the play, to understand the mental states of their peers and the characters which are included in the play. To sustain play, children need to create a shared meaning between each other. Neuro diverse adolescents, in our experience, have often missed these abilities in pretend play.

The theoretical underpinnings of this new intervention called “Imagine, Create, Belong” are the cognitive developmental theories of play, particularly that of Vygotsky and client centred approach developed by Rogers and applied to children by Virginia Axline. The first chapter explains these underpinning theories and how they are practically applied to Imagine, Create, Belong. In the book are 8 sessions for young people who are neuro-diverse who attend mainstream high schools. Research to date has found that this program increases young people’s self-insight into their social ability, maintains their flexible thinking and increases their narrative thinking. This results in more competence in their social ability. The book also includes 16 sessions for adolescents with additional needs and challenging developmental issues. The Imagine, Create, Belong manual is published by Routledge.