Episode Summary
In this episode, I address a question that I know a lot of teachers are struggling with. How to help students that are having big emotions, big reactions. How to help them in the moment. How to help them proactively. What to do about these big behaviors that are happening all over the country in our classrooms, especially ever since COVID. These behaviors are escalating more and more. So I want to get into just the tip of the iceberg here on how to help kids regulate their emotions. I provide practical strategies for emotional regulation, emphasizing that behavior is a form of communication. I introduce the concept of a “calm corner” for students to regain control, as well as methods for teaching emotional literacy during calm moments, like “five finger breathing.” This episode aims to equip you with tools for creating a nurturing learning environment where all students can thrive.
“The first thing [we need] to realize is that emotional regulation is something that needs to be taught.”
Zeba ~ Ep. 55 Strategies for Teaching Emotional Regulation and Handling Extreme Outbursts
In this episode I share:
- Understanding Big Emotions in Students
- The Importance of Emotional Regulation
- Strategies for Emotional Regulation
- Creating a Calm Corner
- Teaching Emotional Identification
- Reacting to Problem Sizes
Resources Mentioned:
- Social Emotional Classroom Supplies
- Social Emotional Learning Year-Long Kindergarten Curriculum Bundle
- The Caring Critters Series!
Connect with Zeba:
- Instagram – @kindergartencafe
- Facebook – @kindergartencafe
- Website – www.kindergartencafe.org
- Tik Tok – @kindergartencafe
Read the Transcript
[0:00] Hey teacher friends, this is a question that I know a lot of teachers are struggling with. How to help students that are having big emotions, big reactions, how to help them in the moment, how to help them proactively, what to do about these big behaviors that are happening all over the country in our classrooms, especially ever since COVID, these behaviors are escalating more and more and more. So I want to get into just the tip of the iceberg here on like how to help kids regulate their emotions. And then after you listen to the episode, if you want more specifics on different topics, let me know and I can definitely dive into those.
[0:42] Music. You’re listening to the Kindergarten Cafe Podcast, where kindergarten teachers come to learn classroom-tested tips and tricks and teaching ideas they can use in their classroom right away. I’m Zeba, creator and founder of Kindergarten Cafe, and I help kindergarten teachers with everything they need from arrival to dismissal in order to save time, work smarter, not harder, and support students with engaging and purposeful lessons. I’m here to cheer you on through your successes and breakthroughs, and offer support and resources so you never have to feel stuck or alone. Ready to start saving time and reducing your stress, all while using effective and purposeful lessons that students love?
[1:37] The first thing to realize is that emotional regulation is something that needs to be taught. Typical kids all the time have emotional responses, but there definitely is a difference between having just a typical emotional response and having an extreme outburst. And obviously having these extreme outbursts can really affect the classroom environment, the other kids in the class, how the child is able to make friends, and our own mental health well-being as well. And there’s two important things to remember. The first is behavior is communication.
[2:16] When kids are having big outbursts and big reactions, or even small ones, they are communicating to you something that they’re not able to communicate with words yet. And it’s our job as teachers to figure out what it is they are communicating. And oftentimes they’re communicating a need, a need to learn a social emotional skill, a need to learn how to work with a partner, how to be flexible, or even just a need to learn consistency, right? That maybe at home they don’t get consistent reactions to misbehaviors, or maybe at home when they act like this they get what they want. And so they’re not used to hearing the word no. It’s possible they won’t have heard the word no. And when you say no, they’re going to have a big reaction to see what they can get out of that. So those big reactions are a way of communicating to you. And we want to look at them like a detective would look at a case and figure out why these behaviors are happening and how can we help teach the student so that these behaviors don’t happen anymore. What is it that the child needs? So that’s the first thing that’s really important to remember. And the second thing that’s It’s really important to remember. It’s just as important.
[3:28] Is the only behavior that we can actually control is our own. It is so important when kids are having big reactions for you to stay calm. Because the more escalated you get, the more escalated the child gets. They react to your behavior. And obviously, it’s really hard to do when a child is yelling at you or throwing things to remain calm. But it’s so important to help the child de-escalate.
[3:53] When you are talking to a child that is having extreme outbursts, you need to remain calm, speak as simply and very few words as possible, because when they are dysregulated, they are not able to process too many directions. It’s also very easy to get into a kind of tug of war with children when they’re escalated like this. Like if a child is jumping from table to table and you you say, that’s not safe, get down. And they say, it is safe. I’m allowed to do this at home. They’re trying to like get into this tug of war of back and forth with you. And that’s going to just escalate things more, whereas you want to just shut it down. So if you keep talking, that’s going to just make it worse and keep it spiraling. Keeping it very simple, keeping the same things, get down. That’s not safe. Or even just not saying anything else anymore until they’ve have gotten down, even though they’re going to keep talking at you, it will help stop that tug of war because you don’t want to get into a battle of like, well, who’s going to have the last word and that kind of thing. It can be so easy to get into this sort of negotiation where you’re trying to one up each other. And that’s not what this is. We’re not negotiating with them. So that’s important to remember is to keep the language simple and to stop talking at a certain point if it keeps getting into that back and forth, right? We’re not negotiating.
[5:21] Like I said, when kids are having big reactions, they’re communicating with us that they need help in certain areas. That might be one of the things they’re communicating that they need to learn different skills. Maybe one of the skills they need to learn is emotional regulation,
[5:33] what to do when they get upset. What are some skills, what are some strategies that they can use when they’re feeling themselves get upset before it gets to this extreme outburst. One of the best strategies that you can use is having a calm corner. So when you notice kids are getting upset, you can send them right to that calm corner and they can be sort of in this cozy little spot where their job is to get their emotions in control. I call it the control spot, but you can call it whatever you want. Every classroom should have a spot like this, a spot where kids can go when they’re upset. And you really don’t need much at all. You don’t want want to be too distracting. I have like a glitter jar and that’s really all I think you need. I also have a breathing ball and I got a couple like sensory things where you know you move over and it switches over the design.
[6:22] Glittery? Okay anyway I’m not doing a good job explaining it. But these different like sensory fabrics. But really all you need I think is a glitter jar and or the breathing ball. I like the glitter jar because I introduced the control spot with the glitter jar as a way to show the kids what happens when we’re getting upset.
[6:44] Because they don’t really understand, obviously, the neurology behind those extreme reactions, but teaching them about it really helps and helps them learn why we need strategies and why the strategies help us. So when we shake the glitter jar, all of our emotions, it’s like our brain, when we’re really upset, we’re thinking a million miles an hour, the glitter’s going everywhere, we can’t see straight, we can’t see through the glitter jar, we can’t think, I make a plan, and we’re just really upset. set. But when we take a minute to take deep breaths, and then I model doing that with the glitter jar and I hold it still and we take deep breaths as a class, you watch the glitter settle to the bottom. And then you can start to see through the glitter jar. And I say that’s when you can then make a plan and fix the problem that made you so upset in the first place. The other thing I like about the glitter jar is it’s a natural timer for the kids for when to leave the calm corner. You can easily make your own glitter jar. There’s a ton of recipes online line just with any old plastic bottle and super easy. The breathing ball, I will definitely link for you, but it’s a great visual of like our bodies when we’re breathing in, our bellies are going out and then we’re breathing in and our bellies are going in and you want to model with the kids how to do it slowly, obviously.
[8:01] But you should definitely have a calm corner space. And so when kids are starting to get upset, you want to train them to go to the calm corner. Now, sometimes kids kids are so upset they won’t go. And it’s really important that they do have the space to go to, not only for themselves to learn how to calm down, but to give themselves some privacy, to protect themselves from the other kids seeing them, and to not distract the other kids as well.
[8:29] So if they’re not going to the calm corner, then you want to reward them with whatever you think will reward them, like stickers, and then they can earn a certain prize or like you can give them a prize right away. Whatever you think it might be, that would be an incentive for them to use the calm corner when they’re upset. debt. Once they start going there on their own, then you can take away those rewards and reward other things instead, or like make it harder for them, like make it more, they need to have it be more chances for them to earn the reward, like more visits. But I will tell you that does work really well because you’re going to need to be able to say like, I need you to move away from the group when you’re acting like this, and I need you to go to the comp corner. Now that was too many words, but I would just say, you’re upset, go to the control spot. Keep it simple. And when you’re rewarding that, if they’re not going when you
[9:21] say it, eventually it really does work that they go and then they can calm themselves down. So in addition to having the space, you need to proactively teach kids a bunch of different things when they’re having these extreme outbursts. You need to teach students how to identify emotions.
[9:38] When they’re upset, that this is not the time to talk to them about this. You need to do it when they’re calm because their brain really can’t take any new information in when it’s in a state of, you know, fight or flight in their heightened awareness and they’re in their outburst. They’re in crisis, so they’re not able to take that in. So you want to be able to teach kids how to identify feelings. And once they’re able to verbalize it, then they’re able to start thinking about, well, what’s a strategy that would help me to calm down. And then you want to teach them those strategies. There’s a ton of deep breathing strategies that you can and should teach your students. And I teach a bunch of them because different strategies help different kids in different ways. So what works for one kid might not work for another kid. I have a freebie on the blog post that I can share with you that has a bunch of these deep breathing cards on them so that you can teach your class these. But the easiest one by far, and the most beneficial one, is putting out your hand and tracing the fingers up and breathing in, and then tracing the fingers down and breathing out, in, out.
[10:50] And up and then down and out, right? And so they do all five fingers and you’re supposed to go slow and it really calms them down. And the best thing that you can do is at random times at different transitions coming to the rug, say, oh, I noticed we’re all feeling a little wiggly, or I noticed we had a lot of feelings coming in from recess, or I’m feeling frustrated today. Let’s all take some five deep breaths. Let’s all do some five finger breathing. And you’re just modeling it all the time. And it really does work that over time, the kids start to do it on their own. And the kids that really struggled with emotional regulation, you’ll see them start to do it. And as soon as you see them doing it, reward, reward, reward in whatever way, verbally or giving a sticker or like being like, you know what? I saw you do that five finger breathing. I saw you were getting upset and you did five finger breathing. And I’m so proud of you. Let’s go play a game of basketball during recess. Like, I’m going to come outside and we’ll play basketball. Like, whatever it is that you think would be extremely rewarding, do that because we want to keep them doing that behavior.
[11:56] Another thing you want to proactively teach students is how to react to the size of a problem because they need to learn that, like, they’re getting, they’re having really big reactions to really small problems when really they should be having small reactions to small problems.
[12:12] And so identifying like, oh, my pencil broke. That is a small problem. Oh, I lost the game. That is a small problem. I can maybe I can win next time. I can play again. And so that’s something that will take a lot of time to set in. But it’s important to teach them that when they’re calm and not upset. And then that way, when you see them starting to get upset, you can be like, wait, is losing a small problem or a big problem? Oh, small problems. What can we do about it? Oh, oh yeah, we could just say, oh, do you want to play again? Great. And it just, it takes time, but it works. There’s no quick fixes to this. And as I said with the classroom management episode, if anyone’s saying there’s a quick fix, it’s just not. They’re lying to you. But all these skills are so important to teach. And then over time, you’ll see the fruit of your labor. You’ll see it working. And that’s why teaching social emotional learning is so important and why it’s It’s so important to consistently be teaching those different social emotional skills, whether you think the kids need it or not, they will at some point. And so it’s important to be explicit about this different skill and the strategies that you want them to learn and give them time to practice when they’re not upset. Because, again, when they’re escalated, that is not the time to learn a new strategy. They cannot take new things in.
[13:29] And if you’re looking to improve your social emotional learning, I have a bunch of different ways that I can help. The first thing I want to highlight is my social emotional children’s books, Felipe the Feeling Frog and my newest book, Trixie the Thoughtful Turtle. You can check these out on my website or on Amazon or you can ask your local bookstore to order them. But they help Felipe the Feeling Frog helps kids learn that all feelings are OK and then what to do about those feelings. links. There’s lots of great strategies in that story for kids to learn. And then Trixie the Thoughtful Turtle helps kids learn about expected and unexpected choices and how our actions affect other people. So those are really good stories to read with kids. And I’ve read them with my students for many years before they were books. And I can say that they really work and the kids really relate to the characters. So definitely check those out. And then if you’re looking for related curriculum to them. You can get those on my website or you can get the full bundle that’s not related to the characters that has more units in it because I haven’t finished all the books yet. They have more units in it that cover an entire year. You can get the full social emotional learning bundle on my website or on Teachers Pay Teachers. We cover everything from feelings to to listening, to impulse control, to cooperation, kindness, respect, all of the things. So check those out. Let me know if you’re looking for something specific, and I’ll send you a link anytime.
[15:01] And our quote of the day is, a boy, six years old, said, look, everybody, and then started to dance. And then the girl, who was six years old, said, is that a happy dance or a sad dance? So important to teach kids how to identify happy dances and sad dances, happy and sad feelings and all that stuff. If you want more help on this topic, you can reach out to me and maybe we can do another episode or you can do a coaching call. I know everyone has different kids and different struggles in their class. So I tried to make this the tip of the iceberg and then we can go deeper from there.
[15:43] Thanks so much for listening to the Kindergarten Cafe podcast. Be sure to check out the show notes for more information and resources, or just head straight to kindergartencafe.org for all the goodies. If you liked this episode, the best ways to show your support are to subscribe, leave a review, or send it to a friend. I’ll be back next week with even more kindergarten tips. See you then!