5 Ways to Help Kids Name Feelings
Simple ways to build emotional language at home.
One of the best tools we can give kids is vocabulary. When your kids start labeling and explaining feelings, a shift happens in their nervous system. They switch from survival mode to thinking mode.
Having words also helps them explain what is going on inside their bodies and their brains so that they can understand it, and so can you.
It's not magic; it's neuroscience. When children can name what they’re feeling, their brains calm down faster. Here are a few simple ways to build that skill at home.
Introduce conversations during calm moments.
Remember that this is a skill that needs to start outside of a meltdown or big emotion. Work on helping your child learn and develop their vocabulary in neutral moments and during everyday life. Watch for opportunities to talk about a variety of feelings in different settings and experiences.
Try out the following times for a chat:
At dinner
While playing
At story time
During family walks
(You can even work in books like Brian the Brain Mind Trip, which introduces the emotion center, the amygdala)
Give your kids the language they need.
Try to move beyond the basics of “mad” or “sad” so they have better options to choose from. Try things like disappointed, embarrassed, lonely, and irritated. The more precise the word, the more manageable the feelings can become.
You can talk about how your body feels when you have specific emotions - like how being nervous can make you fidget, or how anger can make your hands feel tense, or how panic can make your heart beat very fast. This can help them recognize what they are experiencing when it happens.
Be a good emotional role model.
Talk about your emotions. Be open with your kids and talk about how you are feeling. For example, depending on the age of your child, you can say, “I’m feeling overwhelmed right now. My shoulders are very stiff, and I want to scream. I’m going to take a break. I need to sit down for a couple of minutes and take some slow breaths to calm down.”
Kids learn language and positive strategies from watching people around them. It’s okay to share when you are having big feelings too. It helps them know those feelings are normal and how to handle them.
Give gentle suggestions.
If your child is struggling to express how they feel in a particular moment, you can guess gently. Instead of asking a general “what’s wrong?”, you might say, “Are you feeling frustrated?” (or whatever emotion you think they are showing). Even if you guess wrong, you’re modelling emotional language and helping them put a name to the feeling.
Point out examples in your child's world.
Use stories, shows, and experiences as practice. Pause during a read-aloud or in the middle of a TV show and ask questions like, “How do you think this character feels?”
It’s often easier to name feelings in someone else first. Then you can talk about that feeling, why they think that emotion is happening, and how they recognize it in the character. It also allows for the development of empathy - understanding how someone else feels by putting themselves in their position.
Although they can be helpful, remember that you don’t need a full feelings chart on the wall to help your child learn and recognize emotions. Just start noticing and naming. Over time, those small moments build emotional fluency.
Have you checked out our self-regulation companion resource? It is perfect to pair with Brian the Brain and will help guide you when talking with your kids about regulation and emotional control. It will also help you understand co-regulation and how to better support your kids when they're having a hard time.
Disclosure: This blog post was outlined with help from AI, but written by human intelligence.