Blog, Cognitive

Helping Your Child Understand and Manage Their Feelings

As parents, we want our children to be happy, confident, and well-prepared to face life’s ups and downs. Understanding and managing emotions is a crucial part of this journey. By teaching our little ones how to express their feelings and handle difficult situations, we provide them with valuable skills for their future and set the foundation for their lifelong emotional well-being.

Here are 5 effective strategies to support your child’s emotional development:

  1. Teach About Feelings:
    • Name and acknowledge feelings throughout the day: You can express how happy you are to see them when you pick them up from kindergarten, discuss how a character in a book might feel sad when they lose their favorite toy, or talk about their frustration when they couldn’t find the puzzle piece they were looking for. This helps children learn how to express their emotions, which ultimately eases tension.
    • Show that all emotions are normal, including the ones like anger or fear: Teach them that there are no bad or good emotions; they’re all normal! Let your child know that it’s okay to have these feelings and that everyone experiences them from time to time, including you!
    • Engage in pretend play with your child to help them practice managing emotions: For example, if they’re afraid of going to the doctor, you can play doctor and patient together, taking turns in each role. This helps your child see both sides of the situation.
  2. Show How You Handle Your Feelings: Describe your own feelings and how you manage them. For example, “I’m very frustrated now, let me take a deep breath and count to 10.” Parenting is a wonderful opportunity to practice emotional awareness, and it’s important to remember that you don’t have to be perfect. Just like your child, you can learn and grow in managing your emotions too. By recognizing and expressing your feelings, you show your child that it’s okay to feel things and that we can all improve at handling emotions together.
  3. Create Routines for Tough Moments: Make routines for times when your child tends to get upset, like during mealtimes or before bedtimes. Let them make choices within these routines. Check out our recommendations for mealtimes here and bedtimes here.
  4. Provide Coping Tools: Teach them about things to do when they’re having a hard time:
    • Breathe Together: Breathing is a great way to help us calm down. You can make it fun by asking your child to imagine holding a dandelion. They can take a deep breath through their nose, hold it for a moment, and then slowly blow out through their mouth, like they’re blowing the seeds away. Blowing bubbles is another fun way to practice calming breaths.
    • Create a Comfort Box: During a calm, happy moment, work with your child to make a “comfort box.” Let them decorate a small box however they like, and help them fill it with items that make them feel safe and cozy, like their favorite stuffed animal, a soft blanket, or a stress ball. This box will be there for them when they’re feeling upset.
    • Play the 5 Senses Game: Help your child calm down by focusing on their five senses. Ask them to name one thing they can hear, one thing they can see, one thing they can touch, one thing they can taste, and one thing they can smell.
  5. Use Screen Time to Teach Coping Skills: While it’s not ideal to rely on screens to calm kids down during difficult moments, educational apps and games can be valuable tools for supporting their social-emotional development in moments of calm. There are many excellent apps available that help children learn about emotions through interactive games, such as Sesame Street and WonJo Kids. Look for mobile apps and games that focus on understanding and managing emotions and include activities like breathing exercises, emotional recognition games, and characters in TV shows who model good coping mechanisms.

Even though it can be challenging for you as a loving parent, every emotion your child experiences is an opportunity for growth. By helping them understand and manage their feelings, you’re giving them the tools they need to handle life’s emotional ups and downs with confidence!