Answering the Question “Why Do We Lose Control of Our Emotions” is a key first step in helping kids understand their emotions. This is the focus of the first step of Hope 4 Hurting Kids’ Jump In! Stand Strong! Rise Up! Method (A Comprehensive Plan for Dealing With Emotions). This video from Kids Want to Know is a great explanation for kids and adults of how emotions get out of control and how our brain reacts when they do.
The following video is set to the music of Blink 182’s song “Stay Together for the Kids” and accurately depicts the impacts of divorce on children. The video provides a picture of what children of divorce go through. In particular, this video highlights the pain children of divorce feel and makes a link between that pain a teenage suicide. There are some disturbing images (including a picture of someone with a gun to their head) in this video, but they reflect the very real pain that many children of divorce feel. The lyrics to this song are reflected below the video.
Here are the lyrics to this song. As a parent, it may be easy to read the following lyrics and get defensive as the song is written from a child’s perspective who clearly blames his/her parents. Instead, I encourage you to hear the pain reflected in the song.
This great video from Learning Time Fun Jr. helps young kids (think toddlers through early elementary aged) to learn feelings and emotions by encouraging them to look at the characters’ faces and repeat the emotion.
This is an awesome tool to help younger kids begin to develop the emotions vocabulary that will serve them so well later in life if, and when, they face difficult circumstances.
This video from Sentis is part of a series of videos that explore how the brain works. This installment examines emotions and the brain in language that is very easy to understand.
In this TED talk from Kelly McGonigal asks whether it is stress itself or how we think about stress that is harmful to our bodies. As you listen to this informative TED talk, think about how you talk about stress with the kids in your life. How they approach the stress in their lives can have a serious impact on how they deal with it.
Just Breathe is an awesome short film from Julie Bayer Salzman & Josh Salzman that offers a kids’ perspective on anger and big emotions and how to deal with them.
They describe the video as follows:
The inspiration for “Just Breathe” first came about a little over a year ago when I overheard my then 5-year-old son talking with his friend about how emotions affect different regions of the brain, and how to calm down by taking deep breaths — all things they were beginning to learn in Kindergarten at their new school, Citizens of the World Charter School, in Mar Vista, CA. I was surprised and overjoyed to witness first-hand just how significant social-emotional learning in an elementary school curriculum was on these young minds…
As a filmmaker, I am always interested in finding a subject worthy of filming, and I felt strongly that Mindfulness was a necessary concept to communicate visually. Thankfully my husband, who happens to be my filmmaking partner, agreed. We made “Just Breathe” with our son, his classmates and their family members one Saturday afternoon. The film is entirely unscripted – what the kids say is based purely on their own neuro-scientific understanding of difficult emotions, and how they cope through breathing and meditation. They, in turn, are teaching us all …
In ministering to children from disrupted homes, we stress the need to empathize with what the kids are going through – not sympathize! This great video is one of the most succinct explanations of the difference between empathy and sympathy that I have found.
The video makes some great points, and I encourage you to watch the whole thing (it’s only 2:53 long after all).
One of the interesting things in the video was a study of professions where empathy is relevant and identifying four components of empathy:
Perspective taking (taking someone else’s
Staying out of judgment
Recognizing emotion in other people
Communicating that
There are some great takeaway quotes from the video too: Continue reading
There are so many hurting kids out there who need a new home. Thank God for good foster parents and adoptive parents who don’t judge these kids but love them through. Check out this powerful video on the importance of really understanding hurting kids.
