5 Ways Brian the Brain STEM Books Enhance Emotional Intelligence and Promote Mental Health

Brian the Brain is a STEM children's book series that introduces children to their Brian. Each contains a different bite sized lesson, covering topics like Neuroanatomy, growth mindset, and how the brain learns. The book series acts like a guide to help children use, care for, and grow a healthy brain.

This science series takes the narrative beyond academics, teaching children about mental health, social emotional learning, mindfulness techniques, and how to shift their mindset to achieve their goals. Each simple but effective lesson is told within a fun and relatable story. Children connect to the colorful pictures and the story elements.

Children are concrete learners, and the Brian the Brain series allows them to see what is happening inside their brain. Understanding their brain gives the child the tools they need for emotional regulation, mindfulness, and resilience. Since they can see it they can better understand it.

1. Teaching Emotional Resilience Through Brain Science

By reading the Brian the Brain series children understand that the Brian is constantly learning and adapting. This understanding is key to resilience as it helps children understand that overcoming roadblocks is a natural part of life and development.

Children learn about neuroplasticity, the brains ability to change as we grow, or adapt to take on new functions when encountering injury or illness. Understanding this concept of neuroplasticity helps children to persevere when they feel like giving up because it shows them that mistakes help the brain grow.

For example in "Brian the Brain Mindset Go!" a girl named Marta is trying to train on a challenging obstacle race. When she fails again and again children get an inside look at her brain and neurons. They see that instead of giving up, Marta's brain is focused, doubling down on figuring out a new technique to turn failure into success!

2. Promoting Mindfulness with Brain Awareness

Understanding how the brain processes emotions is a powerful mindfulness tool. When children can visualize how their brain responds to emotions they can also visualize their brain calming down. They can better connect to why we do deep breathing and other calming activities.

Brian the Brain explains how the amygdala responds to emotions, while the prefrontal cortex makes decisions. This understanding can help children recognize their own emotional response and label it. It can help them recognize the importance of keeping their amygdala and prefrontal cortex connected and working together.

In "Brian the Brain Mind Trip," Brian takes a tour of the brain and children are able to recognize what parts of the brain are responsible for different jobs. They learn that the amygdala can explode with anger, but that with some fun breathing techniques it can reconnect with the prefrontal cortex and calm down. Brian also explains how different sensations can be grounding and calming for us. These practical and simple strategies are easy for children to use, and are introduced in such a fun way that children don't even realize they're learning.

3. Helping Kids Regulate Emotions with Scientific Thinking

Emotional regulation is a popular topic in parent groups! For children, remaining regulated can be difficult because their prefrontal cortex (the front of the brain that regulates emotions) is still developing. Children struggle with abstract concepts, but neuroscience makes emotional regulation and processing visual! Children can see how a chosen action changes their brain, helping them understand cause and effect thinking.

Learning mindfulness techniques, like pretending to blow out candles or touching something soft or hard gives kids practical ways to regulate their emotions. Kids learn these lessons in a fun way, so they have these new tools to rely on when they are having trouble staying in control. Story telling is a really effective way to teach young children because it helps them better relate to the lesson material.

4. Encouraging Social-Emotional Learning Through Engaging Stories

Each book in the Brian the Brain series is written as a fun engaging story. Children get to read about relatable experiences and see how the brain impacts their daily life. They can relate to some of the challenges the characters in the book face.

As Brian and Smarta interact throughout the story, kids see examples of teamwork, encouraging each other, and empathizing with each other. Instead of just watching Smarta struggle, Brian encourages her to keep trying and reminds her that she will keep improving.

The strong growth mindset focus on Mindset Go shows kids how they can improve when they persevere through challenges. Seeing Marta struggle so much at the beginning of the story, children watch as she works hard to keep learning and improving. She slowly makes gains until one day she can do it, and hard things start to feel easy!

5. Boosting Confidence with a Growth Mindset Approach

The Brian the Brain books teach kids that I intelligence isn't fixed. It's a skill that can be learned. Through practice and effort kids learn that they can improve!

By understanding how to strengthen neural pathways in a practical way gives kids the confidence to keep learning. As they see their hard work pay off their confidence only grows stronger!

In "Mindset Go!" Marta must overcome a challenge. When her uncle Ryan encourages her to keep trying her brain Smarta explains how her effort is making her pathways stronger. Not only does she build stronger pathways she figures out new and better ways to approach her problems through trial and error, proving that mistakes are learning!

Browse Brian the Brain

Brian the Brain combines STEM learning with emotional intelligence. This helps kids develop a growth mindset, build resilience, mindfulness, and confidence. Children love to discover the how and why of emotional learning by exploring how the brain works.

Add Brian the Brain into your science or health curriculum for a lesson that leaves an impression. You will be supporting both science learning and mental health.

Browse the Brian the Brain books to find the perfect fit for your program!