Feelings! They’re Just So BIG!
Four ways to help your children successfully manage emotions
Emotions. Kids have all the emotions but don’t come into the world knowing how to appropriately express them. One of the more exciting, or terrifying in some cases, aspects of being a parent is helping your child learn to navigate all the feelings. Before they can learn to act appropriately, it’s important for them to have the right vocabulary.
Here are a few strategies for developing a great emotional vocabulary followed by strategies for helping your child develop self-regulation skills.
We’ve all seen it: a toddler total meltdown over something seemingly insignificant. Parenting pros step in and say something like: “Oh my, it looks like you are pretty frustrated today!” This brilliant bit of parenting not only helps defuse the situation, but it also helps the child identify the big feelings they are having. This technique is one of many tools that adults can use to help their child identify what they are feeling. Here are a few other ways parents can help children learn to use their words when it comes to developing their emotional vocabulary, something many adults struggle with as well.
Faces Mood Chart
When my children were very small, we had a “faces with different moods” magnet on the fridge: visual images that showed what happy, sad, frustrated, angry and other emotions looked like. It was a great way to touch base with each other and to take the opportunity to put names to different emotions. We also had lots of fun imitating the faces. Each child could move the frame throughout the day to the emotion they were feeling and then we talked about it. Parents can make this a bit more personal by snapping photos of the child (or friends and family) with different expressions to help with visual identification of mood.
Mirror
Showing a child what they look like when they feel a certain way can help them name the emotion and also help them develop emotional intelligence to identify the same emotion on others’ faces. This identification of others’ emotions is an important part of social development and can lead to development and maintenance of friendships.
Words
Sometimes the child might have a general idea of what they are feeling but not have the words to fully express their feelings. You can make a big list or use a wheel that has easily identifiable emotions and then names more with granularity. The important part is to help your child identify feelings as they feel them so they have that immediate word/feeling association.
Read together!
Last but not least, and not surprising advice coming from a librarian, READING TOGETHER is an excellent way to identify and talk about emotions. As you read books together, you can look at the pictures and try to infer feelings the characters might be experiencing. This is usually pretty easy (and fun!) because children’s book artists create very expressive faces.
Here are some books to assist with developing a child’s emotional vocabulary:
- So Many Feelings by Larissa Honsek
- When Sophie Gets Angry—Really, Really Angry by Molly Bang
- Lena’s Shoes Are Nervous by Keith Calabrese and Juana Medina
- A Is Amazing! Poems About Feelings edited by Wendy Cooling
- Today I Feel Silly & Other Moods That Make My Day by Jamie Lee Curtis and Laura Cornell
- Bernice Gets Carried Away by Hannah E. Harrison
- My Many Colored Days by Dr. Seuss
- Shady Baby Feels by Gabrielle Union-Wade and Dwayne Wade Jr.
A Word About Self-regulation
Now that your child has developed a robust emotional vocabulary, you can help your child develop self-regulation, which is a tough but valuable skill to learn. As children grow, they generally become better at remaining calm and thinking before they act, but find ways to provide structure, encouragement and breaks to support that self-regulation growth.
Learning to navigate big feelings is a challenge at any age, but these tried and true strategies aid adults as they help children develop skills that will benefit them throughout their life.
Melody Palmer is the Youth Librarian for the South Broken Arrow Library. She is also a mother and grandmother who loves spending time baking and reading.
