Key Stage 2 Emotion Activities

Drawing a line explain to the children that this represents your day.  The beginning of the line is the beginning of your day and the end of the line is the end.

Ask one of the children to come up to the front of the class.  Explain that you are using this child as an example of their day.

Draw a smiley face at the beginning of the line explaining that when you woke up you felt happy and content.  Move a quarter along the line and draw a picture of a sad face at breaktime.  Explain that someone had pushed the child over so now she/he is feeling sad.

Now explain to the children that this was just a moment and we shouldn’t let one small incident affect our whole day.

Using the line as a visual explain how something can affect our whole day when we can continue the day more positively and we let it go.

Continuing along the line draw a picture of smiley faces at lunchtime, home time and bedtime as the child has not let one small incident affect their whole day.

Benefits:

This activity demonstrates how we should not let one incident affect our whole day.  This promotes positivity and resilience.  Using the line as a visual to provide a better understanding of how to deal with emotions.

Resources:

Interactive whiteboard

Pen

Ask the children to draw a picture either using crayons, coloured pencils or paints.  Move around the class and ask the children questions such as:

What have you drawn?

Why do you think you have drawn that?

What does this mean?

How does this picture make you feel?

Choose some children to come and show their pictures to the class and explain what they have drawn.

Benefits:

Art is a form of expression and creativity.  Allowing children to express themselves through art is a good way for them to share emotions and ideas if they want to.  This activity develops creativity and expression.

Resources:

• Paper
• Crayons, pencils or paint
• Paint brushes
• Water

Discuss with the children things that make them stressed or anxious.  Using a bucket template demonstrate the things that have made you stressed, for example being stuck in traffic. 

Provide the children with a template and ask them to write, or draw pictures of things that make them anxious and stressed inside the bucket.

Using your bucket template demonstrate to the children that sometimes when our bucket of stress becomes full and overflows, this then affects our daily life for example making us feel anxious, having panic attacks. 

Draw a tap in your bucket and discuss with the class ways they can help release some of that stress for example practicing meditation, being in nature, telling someone, doing something they enjoy, mindful colouring, breathing techniques.

Ask the children to go back to their bucket, draw a tap and write down ways they can release some of their stress.

Benefits:

This activity is providing a safe and secure space for children to discuss what situations make them feel anxious.  Using the bucket as a visual they can see how once it fills up it can then become a problem therefore demonstrating the importance of using strategies to help release some of their stress.

Resources:

• Bucket template
• pencils

Discuss with the children about different emotions that we might feel.  Talk about anger and how this makes us feel inside our body. 

Discuss with the children ways we can help ourselves when we feel angry.  This could be using a stop button (taking some deep breaths), breathing techniques, count to 10, have some time out, go for a walk in nature, listen to some calming music or do some mindful colouring.  Encourage the children to come up with their own ideas of how they can help themselves.

Using a body template ask the children to colour code different areas to show how it makes them feel in their body.  For example, the child may colour red arms and legs as this part of the body feels hot.  The face may be green which is colour coded as feeling tingly and the heart may be blue colour coded as feeling cold.  There is no right and wrong way for a child to complete this.  It is used for the child to express themselves and may be an opportunity for a child to open up about their emotions and feelings.

Benefits:

This activity is providing a safe and secure space for children to express how they feel.  It is providing the child with an opportunity to gain more understanding and awareness of their emotions and how to deal with these emotions once they arise.  This will allow children to control their feelings in a more effective way.

Resources:

• Body template
• Coloured pencils or pens

Discuss with the children and write on the board

• What makes us angry?
• How does it make us feel in the body? (e.g. sweaty palms, clenched teeth, shoulders raised, feeling emotional)

Ask two children to come to the front of the class.  Ask child one to pretend to throw a pencil at child two.  Ask child two how they would feel and how they would react. 

Ask the children in the class to take one minute to discuss with their partner

• How would you feel if someone threw a pencil at you?
• How would you react?

Discuss with the class their answers and explain that we all feel frustrated at times and that some people are more sensitive than others. 

Using the two children again explain that if the child retaliates with aggression, throws something back, storms out of the class and gets into trouble with the teacher and parents this behaviour will not make them feel good.  Use the examples of how it makes us feel when we are angry to demonstrate the negative impact that anger has on our body and emotions.

Discuss with the class how things could have been different in this case using the examples of things we can do to help ourselves when we feel like this.  Explain that we all have a choice and it is about making the best choice that makes us feel good.

Benefits:

Through discussion the children are able to gain an understanding that we all feel frustrated at times.  Providing strategies that children can use to help deal with their emotions will give them the opportunity to help themselves feel calmer in difficult situations.  This highlights that we all have choices.  This activity develops understanding of emotions, improving resilience, self-awareness, relationships and reduces anxiety.

Resources

• Whiteboard or IWB

Ask the children to fast forward to the age of 25.  Ask them to draw a spider diagram, writing their name in the middle.  Ask them to write down how they see their life at this age for example having lots of friends, what job would they like, where would they live, where would they go on holiday, what hobbies they would have.

Discuss with the class what they have written. 

Ask the children to think about how they will achieve these things for example working hard at school, being kind to people.

Benefits:

This activity improves children’s focus and determination, creating positivity and developing awareness of how our behaviour and choices create a positive outcome.  The children can use their imagination and produce goals.

Resources:

• Paper
• Pencils

Sit the children in a circle.  Explain to the children that you have had a stressful morning.  Each stressful occurrence that you discuss, shake the bottle of coke.  For example, your children wouldn’t get ready for school, you couldn’t find your shoes, you were late, your car wouldn’t start, stuck in traffic.  Explain that the bottle of coke is how you feel.  Now pass the bottle around the circle asking the children to tell one thing that may have made them frustrated this morning. Once the bottle has moved around the circle ask one child what they think will happen if they opened the bottle.  Explain that this is how we feel sometimes when things keep going wrong and we feel like we are going to explode just like the coke.  Discuss with the children ways to help them during these times for example practice some meditation, yoga, calming breathing, stop button, timeout, counting, listen to calming music, being more organised.

Benefits:

The children gain an understanding that we all have difficult and frustrating situations at times.  This activity provides children with tools to help deal with negative emotions, improving resilience and reducing anxiety and stress.

Resources:

• Bottle of Coke

Place 3 trays at the front of the class with a smiley face, sad face and no facial expression.  Ask the teaching assistant to observe the children coming into the class. Ask each child to place a counter into the tray to express how they feel that day.  This allows teachers to observe how children are feeling and if there are any children needing support that morning.

Benefits:

This activity allows the children to express how they feel and makes teachers aware of any child that may need extra support that day.  It develops children’s expression and gives them the opportunity to gain support if needed.  This will help with self-esteem as children build confidence to express themselves and share feelings with others.

Resources:

• Sad, happy, no facial expression faces
• 3 trays

Ask the children to write a list of emotions on one side of a piece of paper.  Ask the children to share their ideas. 

Ask the children to put their hand up if they ever feel worried or anxious.  This highlights the fact that we all get anxious at times.  Discuss with the children what makes them worried or anxious. 

Ask them to write down on the other side of the paper how does it make them feel inside their body when they feel anxious.  For example butterflies in stomach, sweaty palms, heart beating faster, crying.  Ask the children to share with the class how they feel.

Ask the children to discuss, and write on the board, what they can do to make themselves feel better when they feel like this.  For example mindful colouring, do something they enjoy, play with their pet, listen to music, go outdoors, play an instrument, focus on something else or practice breathing techniques. 

Benefits:

This activity develops children’s self-confidence to help themselves when feeling overwhelmed with emotions.  It allows children to discover for themselves ways to find comfort when they feel anxious, reducing stress and improving resilience.

Resources:

• Paper
• Pen
• Board or IWB

Separate the children into small groups providing each group with an emotion word such as happy, sad, angry, love, peace, calm, grumpy.  Ask the children to discuss the words and answer the questions:

• How does this word make you feel?
• What situations make you feel this emotion?

Ask the children to talk about this with the class and share their experience of these emotions writing key points on the board.  Explain the importance of children expressing themselves and listening to those around them, supporting one another.

Benefits:

This activity gives children an opportunity to express their feelings and encourage them to share their emotions.  It develops their vocabulary and helps them communicate, building self-esteem and improving relationships.

Resources:

• A range of emotions written on separate paper
• Whiteboard or IWB

Discuss with the children how our body feels when we are sad/happy/angry/excited/grumpy.  Use a spider diagram to share the children’s ideas with the class.  Use your own examples of how you feel in your body. 

Benefits:

This activity gives children an opportunity to express their feelings and encourage them to share their emotions.  It develops their vocabulary and helps them communicate, building self-esteem and improving relationships.

Resources:

• Whiteboard or IWB

Using a range of colours ask the children what colour means to them.  For example, show the children the colour red, ask the children

• Is this colour a happy/sad/angry colour?
• What emotion does this colour remind you of?
• Why does this colour remind you of this emotion?
• Does this colour remind you of a particular time in your life or a person?

Following this discussion give each child a colour (small coloured piece of paper).   Choose specific children in the class or ask each child the following questions

• What does that colour mean to you?
• What emotion does this colour remind you of?
• Why does it remind you of this emotion?
• If your colour was a sound what would it be?

Benefits:

This activity gives children an opportunity to express their feelings through colour.  It encourages them to share their emotions and experiences.  It develops their vocabulary and helps them communicate, building self-esteem.

Resources:

• A range of small coloured paper

Provide the children with pen and paper and ask them to create a poem or rap about being happy.  The children may plan their writing by creating a list of rhyming words.  The start of the poem, rap or writing might be ‘When I am happy I………’ Play some calming music in the classroom to create a tranquil ambience.

Benefits:

This activity allows the children to express themselves using creative writing.  This provides the children with a focus, promotes positivity and self-esteem.   When the writing is complete ask the children to share with the class.

Resources:

• Paper
• Pens
• Music

Provide children with a range of weather symbols for the children to choose from to express how they are feeling.  This can be used at the start and end of a PSED session to identify if the session has improved the child’s anxiety and stress.  For example, using a sunshine for feeling happy, cloud for feeling okay, dark cloud for feeling grumpy and rain cloud for feeling sad the children can circle the weather symbol to demonstrate how they feel. 

Benefits:

This activity lets the children to express how they feel and allows the teacher to evaluate if a PSED lesson has been successful.  This will help with self-esteem as children build confidence to express themselves and share their feelings with others. 

Resources:

• Weather evaluation
• Pencils

Using two pieces of paper, per two children, draw a grid of six on each.  On one, write an emotion in each grid such as happy, sad, angry, excited, confused, frustrated. 

On the other paper write a description of each emotion in each grid, then cut out each description. 

Put the children into pairs and provide them with a grid with emotions and 6 descriptions for them to match.

When the children have completed the activity share with the class to see if they have matched the emotion to the description correctly.

Benefits:

This activity allows the children to recognise their emotions and understand how the emotion makes them feel.  It is a good opportunity for them to recognise that everyone has these emotions and will feel the same.  The activity builds self-esteem, positive relationships, and communication.

Resources:

• Paper
• Pens

Placing the children into groups, provide each group with the word ‘monkey mind’ written in the middle of a spider diagram.  Ask the children to complete and discuss what they think the meaning of ‘monkey mind’ is. 

Ask the children to discuss their answers with the class.

Explain to the children that we all have a monkey mind which is the voice inside our head, and sometimes our monkey mind can say negative things which then effect our emotions.

Ask the children to write down all the things that they say that may be negative.  Discuss the children’s answers.

Explain to the children that sometimes our monkey mind does not tell us the truth. 

For example, ‘Nobody likes me’.  Ask them to think about is that the truth?

Ask the children to write down how to change their negative self-talk into a positive one.

Benefits:

This activity provides children with an awareness of their monkey mind.  Once children are aware of this, they can gain an understanding that this is just a thought and how a negative thought effects their emotions.  This enables children to think about changing their thought patterns from negative to positive.  It develops children’s self-awareness, reduces stress and anxiety and builds on self-esteem.

Resources:

• Paper
• Pencils
• White board