• How do I identify different emotions and feelings?
• How can I manage my different emotions and feelings?
• How do my emotions and feelings affect me and those around me?

That’s not fair!!    It wasn’t me!   You can share my toys!  It’s not my fault!   That’s mine!   Do you want to play with me?  I feel happy!  I cry sometimes when I am sad.     I get tummy butterflies when I am excited!

When educators begin to teach children to count using numbers or spell words, they use many explicit strategies to ensure our children learn the skills required by a certain age or by a certain grade.  There are many teaching tools that teachers use to support all learners.  Some children learn quickly, and some need a little extra time.   This is the same for teaching children to understand and manage their emotions and feelings. 

• A child who is losing a game might become angry and throw the game pieces off the table and onto the floor and storm off in a big huff!
• A child who doesn’t understand that their friend might want to play with another child during recess, might feel abandoned and upset. Another child might deal with situations with their fists and unkind words.
• A child who is uncomfortable in a situation, might not know how to express their feelings and might hide in the playground.

In  Prep- 2 Health Education, we have been learning that emotions are reactions our body has to different situations and feelings are the sensations we have in our mind that accompany our emotions.

• Our students are learning that the emotion comes first, and the feeling comes after that. Our students are understanding that emotions only last for a short time, but the feeling can last for much longer. 
• For example, a person might cry when losing a family pet. They might cry for hours or over a week – but they may feel sad for many months.
• A person might shriek or jump up and down with happiness when opening a much-wanted birthday gift. They don’t keep jumping up and down and shrieking with happiness for days or weeks, but the surprise, joy, gratitude and happiness they feel might last for a long time.

Our Prep to Grade 2 have been learning how to identify emotions and feelings through playing a range of different games.  They have been comparing different types of rules and explaining why we need rules.  Our students know what winning and losing means.  They have been extending their knowledge by trying to understand why some people react differently when they win or lose.  Some students didn’t worry if they lost but they explained why they felt irritated when their friends did not help pack up the game.  Some children began to understand that if they were a “bad loser”, their mood affected those around them.   

Please enjoy these wonderful pictures of our P – 2 children playing games.

Miss K Bramich