If you’ve already read part one of our Responding to Tantrums Series, then you are hopefully starting to get the feel for recognizing your child’s emotions during a tantrum and using your empathy skills to understand what your child’s experience may be. If not, no worries, keep at it – and if you haven’t already read our first post in this series, check it out HERE.
Today we are going to dive into some practical tips for how to support your child or student’s emotions while they are having a tantrum, or as I like to call it, an emotional outburst.
In our last post we talked about the importance of separating the emotion from the behaviour – so today we will talk about how to support the emotion and in the next (and final) post in this series we will focus on how to manage the behaviour.
We start with the emotion because it is at the root of what is happening. The emotions are leading to the behaviours, so we need to address the emotions in order to have any impact on the behaviours.
Okay, so let’s set the scene. You and little Sara are having a great time playing with her construction trucks, but it is time for dinner. You tell Sara it is time to clean up and head to the kitchen. Sara refuses to clean up, so you start to help her, again telling her that it is time for dinner. As you put the first truck away, Sara yells that she is not cleaning up! Suddenly, as if from nowhere, a truck is flying towards your head. You block it just in time to see your precious little Sara throwing all of her trucks around the room. She drops to the floor, screaming and crying, yelling over and over that she is not going to the kitchen! She kicks her legs and hits the ground with her fists!
What now?
Well, since you already read the first post in this series you have probably guessed that Sara is likely feeling angry and disappointed. And even though you don’t see what the big deal is because you know she will get to play with the trucks again tomorrow and every day after, you dig deep for your empathy skills and remember a time when you felt disappointed and angry. This helps you feel more compassionate towards Sara’s experience.
In these moments, the aim is to help kids understand their feelings and learn ways to become calm in the face of difficult emotions like anger and disappointment. Here are a few steps for how to do this during the emotional outburst:
Steps for Supporting the Emotion During an Outburst
1. Stay Calm – If you are not calm, Sara will not become calm. Right now she needs you to be calm to show her how to remain calm when stressed, and to help her become calm – because she can’t do it on her own yet. If this is really hard for you and you find yourself reacting with anger or yelling, then give yourself permission to take a break before responding to Sara. After making sure everyone is safe, you can tell Sara that you are going to take a break to calm down and that you will be right back to help her calm down. You can move to the other side of the room or the hallway and do your own calming strategies like taking deep breaths and counting to ten. When you are calm, come back to help Sara calm down.
2. Label the Emotion – Kids are not born understanding their feelings. They need adults to help them learn what feelings they have and how to manage them. Labeling the emotion you see in a child will help them to organize their feelings so that they have a better understanding of what each emotion feels like. For example, from the story above, you might say something like, “Wow, Sara, I can see that you are feeling really mad and disappointed that it is time to clean up.” – in your most compassionate tone of voice, of course.
3. Practice Deep Breathing Together – Support your child to try a calm down strategy like deep breathing. Since Sara is so upset, she won’t be able to do this on her own and will need you to actually do it with her. You may say, “Let’s take ten deep breaths together to help our bodies calm down.” And then physically do the breathing with her. This means you are taking deep breaths too. A win for everyone!
4. Offer Comfort or Space – Next, you want to ask Sara what she needs to help her continue to calm down. You may ask her if she would like a hug, or rub her back. If she pushes you away or says something like “Leave me alone!” – that is okay, follow her wishes by giving her space, but stay close by and let her know that you are here if she needs a hug. Continue breathing deeply.
5. Help her Move On – Once Sara is calm, you can help her follow through with the original expectation. Here, you can very calmly resume cleaning up together and head over to the kitchen together. You may say something like, “Great job calming your body down, I’m really proud of you. Let’s finish cleaning up the toys and head into the kitchen together for dinner.” She may need a little extra comfort and help along the way as she is still likely feeling the after effects of her big emotions.
Okay, so that is a brief overview of the main steps for supporting your child’s emotion during a meltdown. Now, I know what you are thinking because I am asked it all the time – “Isn’t this just reinforcing her behaviour? Why are we hugging her after she throws her toys, won’t that make her do it more?”
Remember back to our first post that we need to separate the emotion from the behavior. The steps above are crucial for helping your child learn to regulate her emotions. You are teaching her what to do when you aren’t there. And by helping her follow through with the original request, you are not reinforcing her behaviour. If you had given in and let her play for ten more minutes to avoid or end the tantrum, then the behaviour would be reinforced because she would have learned that if she throws her toys she gets to play longer. However, this did not happen. Instead, Sara learned that even though I threw my toys I still had to clean up. She also learned the most important lesson – when my emotions are too big for me to handle, my caregiver is here to help me understand them, and to keep me safe.
Check back in next Monday for the final post in this series – Managing the Behaviour – for strategies to manage the unwanted behaviours that inevitably happen during moments of big emotions. And remember, there is no ‘Easy Button’ for helping children calm down. This is hard work that takes a lot of time and effort. Practice self-compassion when it doesn’t go well and remember that you and your child are learning together.
Until next time,
Meg
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