From a Teacher to a Parent

Emotions are tied into many actions we take every day. As we get older, it can be easier to process and control our actions caused by emotion, but when you are younger these emotions can be very hard to control. Learning to control your emotions instead of letting emotions control you is a skill that teachers and parents must deliberately teach children as it does not come naturally. In the following paragraphs I will discuss ways to approach teaching your child on how to recognize and describe their emotions as well as methods of controlling their emotions.

Emotions can be overwhelming for children, especially if they do not know how to describe how they are feeling! One way to help children define their feelings is by linking it to something they know. For instance, in my classroom I teach my students how to create our “Classroom Forecast”. In this I ask each student if their feelings were a type of weather. If a student is happy or content they will chose a sunny day. When a student feels sad or tired they might chose a cloudy or rainy day. If a student is angry they may chose a stormy day. Letting children describe emotions with something they are able to picture allows for them to turn an abstract idea into a concrete picture in their head.

Another benefit is to allow common language between you and your child to better help communicate your emotions to your child and your child’s emotions to you. For instance, if you are having a bad day it is a great time to lead by example. Tell your child that you are having a stormy day and while you are trying your best to be patient and turn it back into a sunny day, you may need help. This demonstrates to your child that it is okay to feel sad emotions as long as you recognize them and do your best to control these emotions.

The next step once you have taught your child to describe their emotions is to explain to them what to do when they are experiencing overwhelming emotions. How I approach this with my students is to explain how if a storm keeps growing it can start to create lightning which is dangerous to be around. Our emotions can become so big and overwhelming that if others are around us we can hurt them without meaning to – just like lightning. I tell my class that if they see someone with stormy emotions the best way they can be a friend is to give them space until the storm has passed. Then if they are the ones with stormy emotions it is best to remove themselves from their friends until their stormy emotions has passed.

There are various coping methods to help a child calm down from their big emotions, but my favorite to teach my students is the breathing method. One type of breathing that is simple and effective is the “Triangle Breathing”. With this method you teach your child to breathe in for three seconds, hold their breathe for three seconds, and breathe out for three seconds all while tracing a triangle in the air. They repeat this until they can feel themselves calming down. This forces them to breathe, focus, and will help them return to a state of mind where they can make a good choice.

Emotions are hard and we all have made mistakes in the heat of the moment while emotions are high. Our best strategy to help ourselves and the children we are responsible for is to teach them how to recognize their emotions, what to do when emotions get too big, and how to calm down from these big emotions. With these steps we can help our little ones control their big emotions!