This classroom poster is a great guide to help you discuss with your students some possible calming down strategies they can utlise to help self-regulate their emotions.

Many children find it challenging to regulate strong emotions. Children need to be guided along the path of finding calming down strategies that work for them. What works for one child may not be the best strategy for their classmates. That’s why this poster is the perfect visual to display in a chill-out area, or somewhere visible for your students.

Calming Down Strategies for Kids

The calming down strategies provided on the poster include:

• Think happy thoughts
• Take deep breaths
• Listen to some music
• Mindfulness colouring
• Drink some water
• Nature walks
• Read a book
• Talk to a friend
• Build a puzzle
• Use positive self-talk

How to Talk About Calming Down Strategies with Kids

It’s crucial that you spend some time exploring the different emotions to help your children understand and become more aware of their feelings and emotions.

You may like to introduce a calming down strategy a day. Allowing children to act out this strategy and then talk about how they feel after they have completed that particular strategy. Doing this will indicate what method may work for them next time they feel they need some time to self-regulate.

Of course, these are not the only calming down strategies, but it is certainly a good starting point. Why not ask your students what else they would add to this list and create an anchor chart of the additional calming down strategies they suggest.

Calming Down Strategies Flip Book

If you have students in your class that could do with an individual reminder of these strategies, why not print the poster and cut out each strategy. Using a hole punch, make a hole in the right-hand corner and attach the strategies together using a metal ring binder. Students can then pop it into their desks.