Building Resiliency

Labeling Emotions

Labeling emotions for children in childcare is extremely important when it comes to building resiliency. When children understand their emotions it can, "build that rapport with our unconscious mind, we become more tuned-in to different changes throughout the day in our energy and are less numb to what’s going on inside of our hearts" (Melikian, 2022.) When children think less about how they are feeling, it allows them to be more present in learning and understand what they are learning at a higher quality.

(Mindful Little Feelings Chart, n.d.)

Emotions Chart

This tool is useful to help children communicate their feelings and their needs based of their emitons. For example, a child may communicate they are scared and need assistance overcoming their emotion of being scared.

This tool can be used by assisting the educator label the children emotions. When a child is happy, an educator can point the happy face and ask "are you happy?" or when the child is expressing they are sad, the educator can point to the sad face and ask "are you sad?" This cart can be purchased at https://www.mindfullittleminds.com/product/mindful-little-feelings-chart/

Breathing Techniques

It is important that children have the right tools in their toolboxes for when they may feel overwhelmed with stress. When stressed, breathing can help the body, "calm the nervous system that controls the body's involuntary functions" (Department of Health & Human Services, 2015.) Being stressed is inevitable, this why it is important that children know how to cope with the stress in their life, by giving them an accessible way to cope allows them to be able to remember the technique when in a stressful situation.

(5 Star ‘Calm down’ breathing exercise, n.d.)

5 Star Breathing

The purpose of this tool is to give children a breathing strategy that they can use to calm down. At times, young children are not sure how to breath when they are upset and don't understand that breathing helps them feel better. This tool will allow you to show the children that it breathing does help in a way they understand.

This star can be used when a child is upset and is unable to calm themselves down by themselves. You start with your finger at the top of the start follow your finger along the edge, you begin with breathing out for however long it takes for your finger to reach the end, you then begin doing the same thing but breathing in. You can repeat the steps until the child has calmed down.

The 5 star breathing template can be downloaded here: https://www.elsa-support.co.uk/5-star-calm-breathing-exercise/

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