Our Anti-Anxiety Kits ~ Part 2

How do you model, teach and make room for mental health awareness at home or in your work with children?  
In part one of this post, I gave a simple why (we use anti-anxiety kits), and what is included in our 2 baskets. This post will breakdown how we use the baskets (kits). 

I've been using Haley Sez for a couple of years. I connected with Haley because I was in search of easy to use tools to help my child who was (is) on the spectrum. 
Haley has created some great tools and toys  that help children to identify, communicate, and regulate their emotions!
We mix and match her activities with other tools that we have created, or use to mind our mental health and wellness. I use them both with my kids, and in our playschool setting. 

What's not included in the baskets, but is a part of the kits?

Each child at Small Wonders brings a photo of his/her family OR a photo album. Sometimes I add the child's photo to the mix.
Our sound machine has 10 settings that range from waterfall, birds chirping, to a gentle rain. Sometimes I pull that out as well.
Each child's blanket. Sometimes it's enough just to wrap up a child and give him a hug/squeeze.
Our yearbook hosts many photos of each child & his/her friends. Sometimes I add this to the mix (if it's an older child who will not rip the pages).

How I introduced the kits

We start most mornings with circle time. When we first started talking about feeling here, we  began to discuss our emotions using words like (happy, sad, frustrated etc). We discussed how we might express our feelings, as well as the importance of using words if we have them, kindness and gentleness towards one another and etc.

In circle time we sang songs about feelings like this one. We also read a lot of books about feeling, and storytelling, is an awesome way to talk about feelings because you can make up stories using all the children's names- they love this.

Inspired by Haley's Put Your Worry on the Shelf Jitter Gitter Card, we also spoke about catching bad feelings and throwing, blowing or wiping them away. This is something they also enjoyed. 
Then I took out items out of the baskets and we talked about what we could do with each item - we made funny faces in the mirror; but we also made mad and happy faces, to show what those particular emotions may look like.

We squeezed the stress balls as hard as we could and and crunched our silk scarves up into balls.
We used our Jitter Gitter cards. One of the things that I love about the cards is the fact that the child(ren) can look at the cards and have an idea what to do - no reading is required.
These are just a few examples.

When do we use the kits

We have used the kits numerous times. As noted above, one child's need can suddenly become an activity for all the other children (not exactly worded like this). This is definitely a no-no. The stress reduction kits are not and have never been a part of our regular activities. They are used in case to soothe an anxious child. Therefore, I do not allow the other children to "get involved".

Secondly, some children do not necessarily need the kit. I have noticed this in the case of tantrums. When a child is having a tantrum (screaming, kicking, throwing things) this is not the time to drag out the old anti-anxiety kit - at least I should say, it has not worked in my setting.  My primary goal is to calm or redirect a child before a tantrum happens. Simply put, if and when a tantrum happens then all the children are stressed out. Crisis has definitely not been averted.

The third and most important point is that I do not allow the use of the kits to turn into a drawn out one on one session with any child. I learned this lesson very quickly. The use of the kit must be done quietly and respectful - not making it seem as if one child is receiving special attention. So in other words, the kits should not be seen as a reward, but rather a diversion and a means of support when needed.

The bottom line

I hate the idea of time-outs, and I've never really been a fan of especially child-care related time-outs because I find it difficult and stressful, and it almost always fails. Having a mixed-aged group I have noticed 2 things:
1. The older child's temper tantrums scare the younger child(ren)
2. In a small space, time outs are actually ridiculous, because it's difficult for children to understand what is happening (especially when another child is upset).

There is a lot of discussion (with the children) about emotions. We have practised using the kits a number of times, however, from personal experience, I will confirm that working with a diverse group of children is challenging.

I do not always catch the anxiety/stress message until it's too late. Why? Because it's not always possible. I have also learned that children are (a great deal of the time), hot and cold. Moderation is a gift that we don't always get to enjoy.
The biggest lesson that I have learned though is that we as parents and caregivers don't have the right to try to simply just "fix" feelings. Some feelings need to be worked out by the children. 
Oh, and for us adults, modelling the appropriate behaviours, and giving children the tools to work out their feelings before they are stressed out is key. 

What are your techniques? I'd love to hear from you.