Discover how emotional regulation boards help individuals express emotions, build social-emotional skills, and develop coping strategies at school, home, and beyond.
Continue readingAs parents, caregivers, teachers, therapists, humans, we strive to help children navigate the complex world of emotions. Emotions are a fundamental part of our daily lives, influencing how we think, feel, and behave. For children, understanding and managing emotions can be especially challenging. Understanding and managing these feelings are crucial for their well-being. Learning how to effectively and clearly express emotions can be challenging for children and adults alike. A powerful tool that can assist in this process is emotional balance communication boards. These boards not only assist with effective communication but provide clear options for dealing with these big emotions.
Being able to clearly explain to adults and children alike how being emotionally balanced or regulated involves recognizing and managing one’s emotions in a healthy and constructive way.
Giving children and adults the exact words to name specific emotions is extremely powerful. When emotions run high (or low) having the tools to either give a child a voice by using a communication board or provide a visual reminder is imperative.
Grouping emotions is a common way to organize a communication board specific for emotional balance/regulation. For example:
Once an emotion is communicated, providing options to support the child or adult as they manage validates their feelings and teaches life long skills for maintaining emotional balance.
For each group of emotions identified above are specific techniques that are easy to incorporate in any situation. For example:
In conclusion, incorporating emotional balance communication boards can be a powerful way to help children and adults identify, understand, and regulate their emotions. By using this framework, parents and caregivers can support individuals in developing essential emotional skills and techniques that will benefit them throughout their lives.
Spring is springing and hopefully will be sprung sooner than later. Flowers are blooming and the dreary colors of Winter give way to the beauty of Spring.
Flowers are not the only thing blooming this time of year. Everyone’s mood begins to bloom and change as the weather makes its way from cold and dreary to warm and beautiful. Sometimes, loved ones (young and old) experiencing difficulty identifying these moods, let alone being able to talk about them. Being aware of and identifying one’s emotions is very complex and higher level language skill. There are techniques and supports that can be put in place to help your loved one better comprehend and identify his/her moods and emotions.
Start by making emotions/moods more concrete. Use simple terms to label and explain emotions/mood. This doesn’t mean limit the vocabulary used, rather choose the vocabulary based on your loved one. Happy – sad – mad – tired – frustrated are good ones to start. When a loved one is experiencing a specific emotion, let them know what it looks like, feels like, and sounds like. If your loved one is in a particularly happy mood, tell them. “You are smiling and laughing. You are in a happy mood!” “Your hands are balled up in a fist. Your face looks tight. I can tell you are frustrated.” You may want not want to do this every time a loved on is mad or angry as it may make the situation worse, however a simple “I know you are mad.” may be enough. Your loved one will begin to realize and connect how their emotions are communicated and may begin to use the language versus the physical reaction to share their emotions.
Older children need to be made aware of their emotions and ways to better communicate those emotions. Help your tween or teen focus in on the facial features associated with different emotions. This helps to not only make them more aware of their own emotions, but tune into the emotions of others. A game of ‘Emotions Charades’ makes not only for a fun family game night, but a safe way to practice these skills. The Feelings Game and Matching Emotions are free online resources that may also be of interest to you and your loved one.
Enjoy the blooming of the new season as well as watching your loved one bloom.
Yours in Speech,
Lakeshore Speech Therapy, LLC
