Have to explain the brain to kids so they understand their feelings.

 

We all have off days, when we feel like we can’t do anything right. For kids, who’s life experience and therefore achievements, are limited, those days can happen more often. Add in learning difficulties and you know it’s a struggle to see how you are valuable.

 

Big feelings like worry, fear or anger can be overwhelming and difficult for kids to cope with (and some adults, let’s face it!). But there are some things you could try to help you explain.

 

Understanding your brain

Using your hand as a model for the brain, has worked for me. Dr Dan Seigel explains in this video.

 

You can notice others ‘flipping their lids’ and explain to your kids that we all do it, and here’s what we need to do to return our brains to normal. Give it a try and let me know how it went in the comments.

You could take this concept and use it in various ways, that suit your storytelling style and your family. Maybe it’s a brain house, like Hazel Harrison wrote about in Mindful:

Typically, the upstairs characters are thinkers, problem solvers, planners, emotion regulators, creatives, flexible and empathic types. I give them names like Calming Carl, Problem Solving Pete, Creative Craig and Flexible Felix

 

And while our emotions are hugely helpful road signs for our lives, they aren’t always right. So it’s important our kids understand this too. Calm brains make better decisions.

 

These are difficult ideas and learning doesn’t happen when emotions are running high, so these ideas might need to be returned to over and over again. That’s ok, keep at it, you’ve got this.