The emotions and feelings that your students feel on a daily basis impact their learning and ability to concentrate. One way to help students cope with different emotions is by guiding and supporting them along the journey of expressing their feelings on a regular basis and creating a culture where your students feel comfortable to express their feelings and emotions.

This blog highlights a brand new resource we have recently added to the website which is a fantastic visual tool to help students verbalize their feelings. The resources include some feelings charts and flashcards that feature cute little characters in different situations.

“When we can talk about our feelings, they become less overwhelming, less upsetting, and less scary.” – Fred Rogers

Feelings Charts and Resources for Kids

How often have you asked a student how they are feeling only to get a shrug and an I’m okay…?

Is there a student in your class that often complains of having a ‘sore’ tummy?

More often than not, these students are not okay, but can’t quite articulate exactly what they are feeling and why they may be feeling like this. Feelings of nervousness and anxiousness are often very difficult for young children to pinpoint. That’s where visual cues or feelings charts are very helpful.

Most feelings charts provide a page of facial expressions such as a happy face, sad face, nervous face, scared face etc. This is great, initially, when teaching your students about different feelings. However, a lot of feelings can’t always be seen in the form of facial expression which is where it gets a little confusing for children.

Our new feelings charts and flashcards are different and students can draw upon what is happening in an image to help them really express their feelings, thoughts and emotions. They encourage more of a discussion rather than just an ‘I’m sad…’ response.

Characters Climbing Mount Feeling

Our new Mount Feeling resources, illustrated by our very talented designer Karen Mounsey-Smith, features cute little characters in a variety of situations trying to climb a mountain.

As a class, brainstorm and discuss what each of the characters is doing on the mountain and how they may be feeling. Some students may use slightly different terms, encourage this and tell them this is okay – it allows them to use their own thoughts and expressions.

Once they are familiar with the image you can begin to use it to ask them which character they are and why. You may ask them –

Think about how you are feeling right now. If you were a character on Mount Feeling, which character would you be? Why did you choose that character?

 

Example responses may be:

• I’m the character hiding in the middle. I want to hide and don’t want anyone to see me or ask me questions. I feel like this because I’m finding math tricky.
• My character is at the top of the mountain – I really understand what you are teaching me – I feel confident.
• I’m the character at the bottom with their arms crossed – I don’t want to be here and don’t want to try to learn. I’m finding it all too much.
• The character just clinging on is me! I’m feeling very tired today.

Use the matching flashcards in a variety of ways to help support your students.

• Create a flipbook for each individual student to display on their desk during individual work. This helps you easily identify those students that may need some extra support.
• Create a display of feelings for students to display how they are feeling as they enter the classroom.

Characters Experiencing Different Weather Conditions

This fun looking visual, Weather Feelings Poster and Flashcards uses different types of weather conditions. Each character is experiencing a weather condition that can easily be related to a feeling.

• It’s rainy for me today. I’m feeling sad because my best friend isn’t at school.
• It’s a bright sunny day for me so far, I’m happy because I’ve reached a learning goal.
• I’m feeling like it’s a little windy and I’m just holding on – I need a mental break.

Again, the flashcards that match this poster can be used in a variety of ways.

Why not set up a display and students pick the ‘weather’ that best describes how they are feeling as they enter the classroom? Alternatively, give each student a flipbook with these emotions and allow them to change their feeling throughout the day.

We hope these feelings resources spark some inspiration to help your students to vocalize how they are feeling. Talking about their emotions is important and helps these different feelings feel less overwhelming for kids in the learning environment.

For more ideas about how to teach kids about different emotions, check out our blog, Teaching Emotions to Kids in the Classroom.