Feelings thermometer can help manage child emotion

The Wisconsin Office of Children’s Mental Health (OCMH) is offering childcare providers the Early Childhood Feelings Thermometer, a tool to help young children manage big feelings and begin to name emotions. There is now a version of this tool specifically for parents.

Help for Parents in Calming Big Feelings in Young Children, is a visual aid for parents to use with their pre-school age children. The tool helps families identify feelings, as well as ways to calm challenging behaviors, by pointing out activities that can shift feelings.

The thermometer features five zones – starting at green, the calm zone, and lists feelings and behaviors associated with that zone – and goes up to red, the furious zone, with suggestions to help the child in the moment.

“We know that children are struggling with their emotions and acting out,” said OCMH director Linda Hall. “Children communicate how they feel with their behaviors. Our hope is that parents, as well as caregivers and early childhood educators, begin to link behaviors with their underlying emotions. In doing so, we can move kids into healthy zones, conducive to learning and cooperation.”

One childcare provider shared: “A majority of our parents do not know what to do when their child acts these ways at home and they struggle with how to help them. So, at home, they get tablets, TV, whatever they want to calm them down, instead of their parent coaching them on how to calm down.”

To download a copy of the thermometer, visit children.wi.gov.