Feelings & Emotions
Our thoughts can sometimes feel like unwanted guest who spend their time trying hard to convince us that they should stay. They can be loud, unpleasant, and will work hard to get our attention and make us believe what they say.
If we engage them, they grow louder and take more
place. They unpack and decide to camp in our minds.
If, however, we acknowledge them and allow
them to make their way through the corridor
of our minds, their visits are shorter and doesn't
affect us as much.
Suggestions:
- Discuss the difference between thoughts and feelings and how
both of these can impact our wellness if we allow ourselves to
be dragged down by what is happening in our mind.
- Read the free printable and print it for each person.
- Discuss the suggestions and share what other strategies you
may have created for yourself.
- Use as needed.
These free printable pages were created to help children at times when they feel isolated, alone, worried, scared or fearful as they are unable to control what is happening.
Suggestions:
- Rainbow: A craft to help with a feeling of solidarity and belonging.
- Words of encouragement: Having your children write the words of encouragement, they are saying what they need to hear themselves while feeling good about their ability to bring hope.
- The good news report: A reminder that there is always good, joy, happiness and a place for laughter, even when times are hard.
- We're all in this together: A way to remind children that they are being helpful and that their sacrifices are making a difference in the world.
- My circle of control: A visual to help with those important conversations about focusing on what is within our control and choosing how we deal with what is out of our control.
This free printable serves as a visual reminded that our hearts are always connected with each other.
Suggestions:
- To help with mourning/grieving/feelings of loss or missing someone a lot.
- Print and decorate, add names to all the hearts that are connected to yours and discuss how even when we are not physically together, our hearts are always connected.
- Keep in a special place as a reminder that you can always bring someone back into your hearts and memories by thinking about them and feeling grateful for their place in our hearts.
A discussion starter to talk about pain and how we can dig within to learn and grow from it. To use personally or as a guide for dealing with the lessons and wisdom that arises when we are in pain.
Suggestions:
- Print a few copies a keep in a safe place when you need to move past a difficult experience.
- Use as a discussion guide in the classroom in one on one situations.
- Use as part of therapy.
- Use at home.
- Use as needed.
Advertisement
Make the dice by cutting the shape and gluing where instructed. 2 dices for each game. Have the children roll the emotion dice first and then the animal dice. Have them role play what they rolled. Meet an angry turtle or happy elephant.
Suggestions:
- Use to stimulate conversations around different emotions or to facilitate conversations about what is happening in their lives.
- Use blank version to add more to the game or to create your own versions.
- Give each child a blank version and have them express their creativity by building their own game.
- Use as a party activity to have children break the ice.
- Use as needed.
Work together to assemble and complete this emotion wheel. Use at home, school or as part of therapy to create meaningful conversation and teachable moments.
A visual reminder that we have the power to choose which thoughts and feelings we wish to focus on.
Suggestions:
- Talk about what it feels like to carry so much with us. Describe the heaviness of carrying anxiety, fear, stress, anger, re-looping certain thoughts in our heads over and over again.
- Together or alone, try to describe what is happening without justifying it or interacting with the thoughts and the feelings.
- Discuss how we always have the choice to dwell on a feeling on thought. We can choose to open every bag and get lost in our own luggage, or we can move on, focus on something else and let these unwanted bags continue their way up or down the conveyor belt.
- Use this activity to talk about consciousness and living in the moment.
- Use this to talk about emotional luggage and letting go or putting something on hold until we are ready to open it.
- Use this tool to talk about the fact that just because something goes through our mind, we don`t have to focus on it or carry it with us everywhere.
Advertisement
These memory tags are a wonderful way to help children grieve by focusing on the wonderful and unique life lessons left to us from those who have moved on. These were inspired by some beautiful tags we found on the trees in our neighborhood this summer.
Suggestions:
- To help with mourning/grieving or letting go.
- Print and decorate. Write down the name of the person (or pet) you are remembering and write little anecdotes or life lessons in the back.
- Hang in a special private place as a memento for you to keep or in a more open place to inspire others and share your feelings of gratitude.
Create your own set of emotions flash cards to explore the world of feelings and when we use certain feelings.
Suggestions:
- Print on cardstock, use colors, add to the set by using the blank cards.
- Match emotion cards to stories or movies.
- Use as visual reminders when talking about different emotions.
Use these story helpers to create social stories at school, to talk about emotions, to give examples of how to act in certain situations, to help children express their creativity or re-enact something that happened.
Suggestions:
- Have every child in class create a visual representation of themselves or a character they wish to represent them and use these to help children express themselves in certain difficult situations or to create pretend situation.
- Create a set of characters to talk about emotions (Sad Sally, Happy Harry, Angry Amad...).- Create skits using these to ask children how they would feel if...
A visual reminder that we control our emotions. The remote allows us to remember some de-escalation and re-setting steps to calm ourselves until we can decide how we want to react to a situation. This is how we change our emotional channel.
Suggestions:
- Talk about who controls your emotions and try to find examples of how you can bring yourself back to a calm place so that you can control your emotions again.
- Write down some of your own ideas in the blank spaces before assembling.
- Leave the remote in an area where it can serve as a visual reminder.
- Have your child self-control by giving them the remote when the situation demands it.
A fun way to identify emotions based on physical and verbal cues.
Suggestions:
- Pick a movie that identifies different emotions. Watch it with your child and pause it at different moments to see if you can identify the emotions expressed by the characters.
- Make a game out of it.
- Use in the classroom.
Advertisement
All emotions are valid as they teach us something or alert us to a feeling of imbalance. These tools are there to help children understand certain emotions so that they can move past them in healthy and productive ways.
Suggestions:
- Use as a way to discuss appropriate ways of living and moving past strong emotions.
- Discuss how certain emotions show themselves physically when relevant.
- Use as a classroom activity to discuss the power of emotions and how to deal with these strong emotions.
Feelings reenactment game to help children understand emotions. A great way to talk about how to react and understand what is going on.
​
A simple feelings chart to introduce feelings and emotional concept words such as heaviness and lightness.
Suggestions:
-When kids have a hard time expressing their emotions.
- Make a game out of it by trying to find scenarios where you would feel a certain way.
Being able to let go allows children to move on with less anxiety and confusion. It allows them to acknowledge their feelings about an experience and validate their emotions. Use while you create your own letting go rituals.
Suggestions: These types of letting go rituals (this one involves releasing balloons) could be used when moving away, leaving a not-so-good friend behind, in times of changes, when someone we love leaves us, or for other times when we have to say goodbye.
Advertisement
Suggestions:
- Keep as a visual reminder in the kitchen or gathering place so that it can become part of your life habits.
- Use it for yourself so that your kids will see you making an effort to choose the emotions you want instead of reacting to everything that goes on.
- Make one with your child to share tips on how we can reset our emotions. The button is a visual reminder that what we focus on expands. Instead, we need to acknowledge our emotions, decide what we want to do about how we feel (including the choice of letting an event drag us down all day). If we choose to reset our emotions, then button becomes a physical motion that starts the process of focusing on something else.