Managing Children's Emotions

Emotions are difficult to manage at any age but especially for children who do not yet understand them.

Over the years, working as a nanny I have tried many different ways to help children to recognise and express their emotions in the right way. As always some of these may work for your child and some may not. It is trial and error.

• Distraction - take the child away from the situation that is causing them distress and try and calm them down with a distraction. Fresh air is a good one for this - the trees and leaves and clouds etc will take their mind away from the initial upset.

• Validate their feelings - tell them that you can see that they are feeling sad, cross, frustrated etc and explain that that is okay. Give the emotion a name and allow them to see that you have recognised they are feeling that way. Once they have calmed down, always try and talk about what happened in whatever capacity they can.

• Cuddles - give them cuddles and reassurance that this big scary emotion they are feeling is normal and that you are there to get them through it!

• Sensory bottles - this activity works better for younger children as a distraction and a way of allowing them time to calm down. Simply fill a bottle with glitter, baby oil and a little water and leave it in a place in which it can be easily accessed by the child. Whenever they are feeling frustrated and angry, I would encourage them to take the bottle, shake it up and watch the glitter for a few minutes focusing on slowing their breathing. This is also a fun stand alone activity for babies. Just make sure the lids to the sensory bottles are glued shut to make them safe.

• 'Helping Hand' - this works best for slightly older children who are able to stand still for a few minutes even when they are feeling cross. Draw round the child's hand and cut it out and then stick it to another piece of paper. Let little one decorate it and participate so that they know it is theirs. Then stick it on a window, wall, door that is central so that when a tantrum arises, they can find it. The idea is that when they are feeling cross and angry and are lashing out, you can encourage them to place their had on their 'helping hand' and take some time to calm down. When they are calmer, you can talk about it.

• Emotion balloons - this is an idea that was explored in the moment and then extended and turned into a much longer, fun activity that we revisited lots of times. We drew lots of different emotions onto balloons and then held them in front of our faces to display that emotion and talked about how we feel when we experiencing that emotion and what our body language and facial expressions may look like.