I found this resource recently and felt it was too good not to share. I love utilizing the Mood Meter and it works great, but there is always room for more tools in the toolbox.
I like this wheel and how it breaks down feelings even more than the mood meter. Our Mood Meter helps us realize the intensity of an emotion and this wheel can help us with breaking down feelings into small categories. This could be helpful for our younger students.
Helping our students identify a feeling empowers them to take ownership of that feeling. When we share a common emotion language it becomes easier for all of us to identify feelings, support feelings, and either embrace or let go of feelings.
In my small groups I encourage students to explore the variety of emotions on the Mood Meter. I love when they read a word and ask what it means. This opens up a time of learning and exploration. I have observed that as we learn a new feeling word together more students use the word in the following days. The curiosity and growth of one student in my groups has helped increase the curiosity and growth of the others.
When we learn to identify an emotion in ourselves we are more likely to be able to identify it in others. This is true for our students. We can help them grow their empathy and compassion by teaching them emotional vocabulary.
As we teach the words to connect to the feelings we also teach the students that all feels are real, valid, and important. The key is how we handle the emotion. As we teach the emotion we follow it up with the regulation of the emotion. We have heard the quote before, "Name it to tame it."
Once you have helped a student name an emotion, work with them on regulation. Below is a TPT link to free emotional regulation resources.
The first resource has a great poster with pictures and words that display options regarding ways to regulate. The poster could be a great resource to print and place next to an emotion wheel or mood meter.
The third resource has a great activity for promoting affirmations. As we explore emotions we need to build up our students to help them have a full bucket.
The ninth resource has a number of posters that could support a calm down space in your room.
Number 13 has some feelings trackers. This could help students see the change in emotions over the course of a day and week.
As I scrolled through the resources I noticed ones for younger students as well as older students. Explore and find what is right for you. Feel free to also reach out to me and I can help you navigate these and other resources.
I hope that you find some helpful information and start working to build a strong emotional vocabulary with your students.
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