This month, we’re giving away all six books in the Everyday Feelings series. This series uses humor and compassion to show children how to help others—and themselves—feel better when dealing with challenging emotions. One lucky reader will win:
To Enter: Leave a comment below describing how you help children understand their feelings.
For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry—that’s five chances to win! Entries must be received by midnight, February 22, 2019.
The winner will be contacted via email on or around February 25, 2019, and will need to respond within 72 hours to claim his or her prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, or Instagram. Winners must be US residents, 18 years of age or older.
We welcome your comments and suggestions. Share your comments, stories, and ideas below, or contact us. All comments will be approved before posting, and are subject to our comment and privacy policies.
© 2019 by Free Spirit Publishing. All rights reserved.
I help children understand their feelings with books that show children like them dealing with their emotions. I also repeat back what they say and then add identifying words to expand the understanding of the feelings and help to identify how the words and feelings go together.
I give them a hug.
I try to help students understand that they are not the only one who experiences different emotions by sharing my own personal experiences and talking about common feelings that we all experience. In doing this, I hope they feel that they are not alone. I also listen to them express their feelings when they are obviously going through something intense, such as sadness and anger, and let them know that it’s okay.
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As a school psychologist working in a developmental preschool, I use a variety of modalities to help our children understand their emotions. I model, use visuals, read books, sing songs, and incorporate emotions into play (dollhouse, puppets, games, etc.).
I have a wall poster of feeling words and, when necessary, ask children to go to the poster to try to identify how they’re feeling.
As a school social worker these would be wonderful to use in my elementary groups.
I love to use books to read to the children and at times substitute some of their information for the words.
Every day I am more convinced how important it is for children to understand their feelings and how to respond to them. As a child start to understand their feelings ,they begin to make better choices. As an adult I must walk very closely with the child and continue to give positive reinforcement
As an elementary school counselor, I talk with students quite a lot about managing their feelings. I do this in classroom guidance lessons at the lower levels, but also in group and individual settings to help students cope with the many feelings they may throughout the school day, and about their lives at home.
I read children’s stories about feelings and choices. Then, we discuss how the story relates to our actions. From kindness and compassion to integrity and good judgment we go over situations the students may face and how to deal with it.
I help childten understand their feelings by providing their teachers with resources, coaching and technical assistance that allows their teachers to have various strategies to help children express their feelings in developmentally appropriate ways😊!
Being a primary teacher we talk about feelings a lot. We have special presentations, we have lots of classroom meetings at the carpet and also this is discussed through reading. It is an ongoing topic and the next way I am going to teach about feelings is with role play and puppets!
Working through emotions is an every day case in our classroom. We talk them through the rough times and love them every step of the way.
As a counselor, I help students understand their feelings by encouraging their communication. I often use the Zones of Regulation to help script some language about feelings, and as my elementary students grow, they are able to add many more layers to their emotional vocabulary. These books would be very supportive of those I see individually and in small group settings!
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in our prek we talk a lot about how it’s ok to feel happy, sad, mad, joyful, scared, etc. and that using our words to express those feelings is always ok. we also expect them to take responsibility and ask the other child “what can I do to make it better” if they hurt the feelings of someone else.
I use the ideas on this site to help children understand how our feelings fluctuate and how we can build self-efficacy. earnpurplebunnies.com They learn to use problems and helping others to build positive feelings.
I’m a school counselor and I talk to students about identifying their feeling and how feelings are neither right nor wrong. Learning to respond to some of those feelings can be difficult even for adults. We cannot expect kids to automatically respond in appropriate ways. We have to give them options and a safe place to explore these feelings.
I help childcare providers improve the quality of the care by supplying them with tools such as these books to use in their homes. In some cases the providers are dealing with kids that come from CPS cases or custody battles so it would be beneficial for them to use these books to help kids express themselves in a more positive way.
we strive to integrate feelings into our daily routines; discussing both personal feelings and helping children learn to label their own
I describe the child’s facial features and give the language that they may not have developed. For example, I have a 13 month old and he gets frustrated when his toy gets stuck in the toy bin. I will tell him, “oh I see you are frustrated because the toy is stuck. You are crying because you are so frustrated.” This way they can hear the language and eventually equate it to the feeling they have.
Our school provides social groups under the leadership of our behavior coach where students can discuss their feelings and appropriate strategies for dealing with them.
I run many social skills groups at school and in classroom lessons to assist students not only understand their own feelings, but also the feelings of others and showing empathy. We also do Second Step – which has a emotion management unit. The kids love this and we incorporate acting and videos! In many of my small groups I try to incorporate fun activities, games, books that relate to identifying and understanding their feelings. This can include feeling match games, IPAD games that relate to identification of feelings, board games, books, visuals, feelings bingo! Through stories and books with photos, I feel it allows kids to recognize how the character feels and helps them to relate. I love using Julia Cook books in my groups. Other fun things include ZONES Uno and ZONES M & M’s – these fun activities allow students to engage and have fun identifying feelings in group.Thanks for your consideration for this awesome giveaway!!
I help students understand their feelings by having them reflect on the situation and always encouraging them to talk about their feelings.
I use Feelings Jenga (Jenga that I wrote feelings on) in small groups and individually. The student or I define the feeling, then we act it out or talk about a time when we felt that way. We also discuss coping skills if it’s a difficult feeling.
such a great idea!
Often, children with behavior challenges clump their feelings into feeling angry. I teach them about other emotions and how to use their words and breathing techniques to manage them.
Children react to situations without knowing or identifying their feelings appropriately. Once a child can name their feelings, a more measured response often occurs.
I share with my Life Skills teacher – it is his first year and these have been so helpful for him.
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Working in Head Start I work with many children that need extra support in Social-Emotional development. I talk about feeling everyday while problem solving with children. Anyone coming into the classroom will here “How does that make you feel?” or “How do you think they feel?” I describe how their body looks and give them the emotion words if they cannot yet express it themselves. I would love these books to enhance my teaching!
Hi, I teach them all feelings are okay and help them figure out how to express each feeling. I have a feeling poster and a calming corner.
OOH! A calming corner! awesome idea!
I have read several stories with emotions.
Our favorite activity is emotions mask and picking an emotion and drawing it. After it is drawn, hey make the face. These are then displayed to help them understand all the emotions one may experience.
I work with special needs children and I help them to understand their own feelings and the feelings that others are having by helping them to learn about facial expressions (for example what does being happy, sad, or angry, etc. look like?). I enjoy working with these children so much every day!
I would love to share with kids as I look to go back to work and see the benefit from of bibliotherapy with my own kids with “big” feelings!
Today we talked about feelings and the responses our face and body makes when we feel this way. Each student made a particular face of how they look when feeling happy, sad and angry. They each looked at an image of themselves doing this so they could see this expression on themselves and relate it to others.
Trying to understand and relate feelings as they happen or when events occur that produce various feelings in us as adults that they see and in themselves.
These look great! I would read them with my 6 year old then pass them on to her school’s library. Thanks for having a giveaway. Love your FB posts!
I have feelings posters on my wall I refer to often, or kids use them on their own. I also have a deck of feelings cards that are really good and useful.
I would like to have the books to teach my preschool children how to express their feelings in a healthy way. I have an AM and a PM groups 24 children in each. Just imagine how many lives this tool will impact.
Reema Suleiman
Palms Dtate Preschool
I work with young children so we begin by labeling emotions and modeling various emotions. Once they can do that we focus on identifying when they feel a certain way what they can do to help calm their bodies. We use alot of books, puppets, role play, and visuals
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I discuss feelings of characters in books we read and why they feel that way. I also teach conflict resolution with my students. I have an area in my classroom where students can sit down with other students they are having problems with to discuss their feelings and to come up with an idea on what to do that would resolve the conflict while satisfying all those involved. I call it the Peace Table. And, I teach my students deep breathing which they can use if they develop negative feelings to help them calm down and start thinking positively again.
I encourage children to express their feelings. I have a dedicate one month’s worth of storytimes each year to feelings, and we explore all kinds of emotions. We talk about how to express those emotions.
I would love to carry these books in my library, so I can share them with all my kids! Class visits, homeschoolers, Storytime kids, and parents of little ones to help understand their feelings and show them that it is ok to not be ok, but that they can turn it around. Love to have these for my teachers to check out as well!!!!!! A lot of great uses for these stories!!!!
We talk to him about his feelings and try to help him come up with solutions. Following on Pinterest and facebook
Working for the public school, I’m involved with students from Special Needs at the high school, to 1st and 2nd graders in elementary. I truly enjoy seeking out their opinions and ideas. I love reading aloud books that are written by students themselves. I imagine what my little guys would grow up to be (having seen the bigger guys as well!). I try to take the time necessary to allow them to voice their own needs and ideas. It’s challenging but so worth it!
Our class uses the “feelings mirror” activity. The leader shows how he or she is feeling using their whole body. Then everyone else silently “mirrors” the leader. We go around the circle as a check-in.
I’m an elementary school counselor and I teach students everyday about their feelings and emotions. We talked about what feelings/emotions are and how to express them. I am constantly using books in all of my lessons in the classroom and out. One of the new programs we have is teaching students about their brains and their emotions and what happens when they “flip their lids”. I teach ways in which they can get back to their upstairs brain so they are ready to learn. Would love to add these books to my collection for my kiddos.
I am a social worker and I work in the Social Emotional Program. I work with child care providers and parents to help support children’s social emotional development and self-regulation. We work as a team to help children understand their feelings, how to regulate, process, and manage their emotions, and teach calming strategies.
We have a feelings zone display in class that helps the children to name their emotions. It tells them what the emotion may look and feel like and what to do next to help them get back to learning. We have a calm corner with a choice of relaxing activities to help children to get back into the green zone where they are ready to learn. We have a few feelings books (we could always use more) that we look at regularly to discuss and unpick emotions.
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We use the teaching pyramid in my classroom. The children use the emotional check-in board when they come into the classroom and again when their emotions change. We have the calming area where they can go when they’re feeling sad or angry—with cards that illustrate different strategies they can use to calm down and other fidget toys. We use books to talk about feelings and simply narrate children’s feelings and actions to help them recognize their emotions.
I’m an occupational therapist, who after 20 years, works more on emotional regulation than handwriting. We have a family library in our clinic and many, many books come from Free Spirit Publishing! I love everyone of them and wish I owned them all! 😊
i help the children by listening in their own words and listening to them… giving them ownership of how they feel helps them to cope with it better/
Leave a comment below describing how you help children understand their feelings: As a children’s librarian, I offer story times for young children, and I use my voice expressively to help guide the children’s understanding of how the characters are feeling. I also talk to the children about how the characters might be feeling, or how they would feel in a similar situation. It is important to model for the children that feelings are normal and that we need to try to be understanding of others’ feelings (sharing, saying “I’m sorry” when appropriate, etc.).
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I use feelings charts, lots of books about the different feelings, feelings bingo and feelings memory, among other activities to help kids recognize, and understand their feelings and the feelings of others
We talk a lot about how we are feeling during the moment. If there is a disagreement or someone is hurt we discuss it as it happens. We also discuss when we are happy or excited.
I help children identify their feelings by pointing them out in the moment and helping them find strategies to understand those feelings. I love to use books as a strategy to help children relate!
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I help children understand feelings by introducing more language to their vocabulary! I always have a feelings chart during counseling sessions to help guide students to use more descriptive words when expressing feelings.
I believe we need to hear what children are feeling. I want to share that what they feel is their right and that there are reSons to feel that way and how to deal with those feelings. I love this company and what they are Doing with these books
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Working in a preschool setting, we work a lot with identifying and naming our emotions. A few ways we do this is through reading stories, puppet play, feeling charts, and even puzzles.
As a school counselor, I work with students 1:1, in groups, and classroom settings to develop positive coping skills and understanding of emotions. Stories are a great way to open these conversations at any age.
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Helping autistic children understand their feelings
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As an elementary school counselor I go over feelings a lot with stufents. We talk about how each one feels along with what you face/body does and ways we can deal with that feeling positively.
I watch my grandbaby he’s 20 months so theses books look great he’s little has no fears well some but these would be great to teach him and for me to learn on how to teach him about stuff
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Whenever my toddler is experiencing strong emotions, I label his feelings and validate what he’s going through. We love your books for this purpose too!
When children arw exhibiting a feeling I name it and describe it. I then talk to them about how to manage it. We read a social emotional story every day to talk about feelings, what makes us feel that way, and what to do about it. This helps to hit those feelings you can’t talk them through until their calm like angry or frustrated. It always helps to have a huge variety of feeling books.
Students often relate to the stories we read in class. By using books like these I can better help my students to understand their feelings
I ask young children “what feelings go where?” Where are they and what are they doing when they feel certain feelings….. It helps them to tie together their actions to their thoughts and emotions…..
Miss Mary
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Books are such a great way to normalize feelings and help kids understand themselves a little better.
As a lower elementary teacher I teach children are emotions and the different types of emotions that exist. Furthermore how we act when we are feeling the way we are and strategies we can use to change our feelings if they are “not good feelings” to our good feelings.
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I recently had my kids I serve through AmeriCorp make feeling wheels like a dial they can let other know how the feel. Helpful for those who are not in the mood warn others to stay back until my dial moves..lol
As a School Counselor, I’m passionate about ensuring students are able to “name it to tame it”(Daniel Siegel). Teaching the language and understanding of our emotions should be part of every child’s education and I love to use books such as these to explore and normalize our whole range of feelings.
As an elementary social worker/counselor I spend a lot of time teaching students about feelings, what they mean, how to share, etc. I use books, games, puzzles, posters, emojis, etc.
What a wonderful contest! Thanks for the awesome books and for the opportunity to share more of them with our classes.
In my class we work on identifying feelings in characters we read about in books, and then in pictures, and then finally in ourselves and others! The Zones of Regulation curriculum allows us all to have a common language to talk about our emotions.
It is interesting that children often report feeling mad and sad. The feelings in between and the range of feelings they can experience are most confusing. These books would help address those other feeling names that do happen too.
I teach Kindergarten so we talk about feelings A LOT… right now we are learning about kindness and friendship. Each day students are allowed at circle time to tell their peers how they feel and what they appreciate about one another. It is such a great way to start the day!
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I teach preschool and feelings are a big piece in my class for social emotional development! We use conscious discipline feeling buddies to help the kids identify not only their emotions but emotions of others as well. We also give them the proper tools and techniques to express themselves to others by modeling how they may be able to handle a situation. In my class we also have a calming area. Where kids can go by themselves and take a minute to self regulate, I think these books would be perfect to add into that area of my classroom.
In our Nursery class we have a feelings carpet in our Reading Tree corner that has faces corresponding with feeling words like sad, happy, worried, scared, surprised, angry, etc. We also have a feelings chart on the wall under our Reading Tree. We gather together on this carpet to read books like, “The Feelings Book,” by Todd Parr, and “Grumpy Pants,” by Claire Messer. We talk about the characters feelings and we also have popsicle sticks with feeling words and pictures on them that the kids can choose from to describe their own feelings. Our students say the Reading Tree corner is their favorite place in our classroom!
In our preschool for children with hearing loss and/or language delays, I provide weekly social/emotional skills lesson in which we use books, flashcards, videos and conversations to name and distinguish our emotions and those of others. I often take the children’s pictures expressing a feeling of their choice and they like to see their own face and friends’ faces–in one class of mostly-nonverbal children we made a feelings poster using their own faces, not photos of strangers, and they frequently point to it.
Love integrating literacy with social/emotional learning!! Great books!
I work with my kiddos on identifying what the feelings “feel like” before they experience them and how we can recognize it and release it using different techniques.
I would help children learn about their feelings, feeling identification, and ways to self-control their feelings through the use of these books in small counseling groups, classroom counseling lessons, and individual counseling sessions.
We read lots of books on feelings,model, discuss “What if….how does it make you feel?
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We read & talk about what the feeling looks like & I mirror their face or action to show them.
I try to help children understand their feelings by empathizing with them and by using children’s literature.
We talk with children about how their faces look and how their bodies feel when experiencing different emotions. We make a classroom book where our children make different faces. Each photo shows a different emotion. Children can read the book anytime they are struggling with how they feel.
We name the feeling & I mirror their face or action to show them what it looks like & what to do next.
I work to help our youth understand the root of their emotion. By understanding the root of their emotion we are then able to move forward in a healthy way. I aways tell the youth it is ok to feel their emotions and I will help process them in a healthy way. A saying we have is what’s in your mind is your business but what comes out your lips is everyone elses. This helps them to slow down their reaction.
We name the feeling & I mirror their face or action to show them what it looks like.
I coach my teachers to make use of the feelings chart and having the children check in. If there is a child in distress I encourage the teachers to validate the feelings and explain what behaviors they are seeing.
For my little ones we model language to help them identify how they are feeling and how we are feeling. We use mirrors, books about feelings and have a pictures in the classroom. For my older preschool children, feelings are constantly being integrated into our themes and throughout the day. Causes and how to manage feelings are discussed. We have pinwheels for the children to blow to encourage deep breaths when upset.
I work with student K-12 as a Mental Health Counselor in the schools and help them develop social and emotional awareness. These books would be a great resource with my K-5 students!
I think one of the most important ways I try to help children understand their feelings is through talking with them in a manner that is both empathetic and validating. I also try to help them find the vocabulary to express themselves. When possible, I also use other techiniques for helping them process feelings and experiences, such as bibliotherapy, art, and role play.
I assist children with mental health and disability needs by helping them understand the different feelings humans possess, and how these feelings should be appropriately expressed both physically and verbally.
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As a school counselor, I help young students understand their feelings by talking about each emotion looks and feels like in our body. I also use a feelings wheel to help students learn to identify emotions.
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I work as a school social worker and help kids understand the emotions that are going on inside of them. I also help them know appropriate ways to express those feelings.
I teach kids to recognize feelings in others and themselves by looking for clues. The clues are on their face, body language, voices, and inside as well. We talk about feelings that make us feel comfortable as well as uncomfortable.
I work in a school for students with emotional disabilities. We talk about our emotions each day to help our children understand our emotions. We are constantly working on ways to appropriately express our emotions. We do frequent movement breaks to help with frustration, anger, and anxiety.
As a Children’s Librarian, I help children with their feeling by providing a wide range of fiction and nonfiction titles dealing with emotions. This helps them to know whatever feeling they are feeling, they are not alone.
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An accessible art table stocked with supplies and actively listening to our daughter without distractions, especially at bed time when all the stuff comes out, has been our way since the diaper days. Thanks!
I like to sit down with the child and ask them how they are feeling. I also ask them how it makes them feel. We then would continue talking about things like how can we change the way we are feeling. Is there something we can do to make it better? It really depends on the feeling and what the circumstances are that caused the child to feel the way they do. However it all starts with listening to the child always listen!!
We talk about the feelings, what they’re making our body, heart, and mind feel like. What words do we know that help describe the way we feel? What new words can we learn to help describe them? What makes us feel better?
I use stories to help them visualize the different scenarios and alternative that they have to deal with a particular emotion. After each story, I plan a follow-up activity like painting, drawing, exercise, etc.
We teach how our bodies feel and our faces look like when we have different feeling. Then we use parallel talk to describe what we see and give feeling words to it.
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As a school counselor I help students recognize their feeling, empathize with feelings in others, and cope with tough feelings. We do this by reading lots of books in classroom guidance.
I try to help young children with ASD (Autism Spectrum Disorder) understand how to make sense of not only their emotions/feelings but how to read cues from others about how they are feeling.
I help my children by acknowledging feelings. I share how I am feeling and listen to how they are feeling. We also work on behavior we may have during times of big feelings.
I work with children in crisis and would love to use these books to assist them in identifying and coping with uncomfortable emotions.
I work with students who have experienced trauma and we discuss what feelings we have and what those feelings look like. These books would be so helpful with these students!
I work with youth involved in the Juvenile Justice system. I try and help them understand that anger is often a secondary emotion. Often our youth can talk about teaching younger siblings about emotions and it helps them process their own emotions.
As a school social worker I run social skills groups. One of the components is recognizing different feelings and how to deal with them. It gives the students an awareness that anger can be redirected as well as other feelings that can interrupt their behavior.
Everyday there is a student who is dealing with a new emotion. Sometimes its because of another students words or an issue that they are dealing with at home. I recently had students lose a pet and a parent. They don’t understand their feelings and many don’t talk about them. These books would be a great way to share.
I spend the first month of school helping students to name and claim their emotions as part of their self-awareness, then we work on how to self-manage so we are able to spend more time being in the green zone during the school day.
i try to help children understand their feelings by encouraging them to put it in their own words and listening to them… giving them ownership of how they feel helps them to cope with it better/
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I help students understand feelings by giving them alternate opportunities to express themselves. I will have them dance, wiggle sillies out, smash play dough, etc. I also try to discuss empathy and have them put themselves in other students shoes.
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I’d love to use these books with my gifted students they have such a hard time naming their feelings
I try to help children understand their feelings by empathizing with them.
We have regular class meetings to discuss feelings. We also use a calming corner with various tools to help deal with overwhelming emotions. One tool is a mirror for students to see their expressions; they use an “emotion map” that helps them identify the feeling that goes with their expression. We also practice several calming techniques, such as breathing, counting, visualizing, etc.
So often young children (and even those a bit older then young) have very limited feelings vocabulary. I help expand their vocabulary when children are calm – then reinforce when they are having emotional experience, or reading a story about a character having an emotional experience.
As the School Counselor, I help students understand feelings in multiple ways. I read whole class stories about feelings, do interactive activities around the statement, “I feel________today because________.” I also teach Second Step lessons, lessons on character education, as well as restorative peace circles which all involve discussion of feelings and coping skills. I love your publications and share them often with my faculty!!
Thanks.
On Feb 12, 2019 18:33, “Free Spirit Publishing Blog” wrote:
> Free Spirit Publishing posted: “This month, we’re giving away all six > books in the Everyday Feelings series. This series uses humor and > compassion to show children how to help others—and themselves—feel better > when dealing with challenging emotions. One lucky reader will win: ” >
I help my sons know how to be aware of their feelings and promote their emotional intelligence every day by encouraging them to talk about them everyday especially my 12 year old son who has severe anxiety and depression
This series would be great for my elementary counseling students! I’m excited, happy, anticipatory!
I try helping students understand the what and the why of their feelings. Sometimes it clicks right away and other times it takes a longer time.