Helping Children with Limited Verbal Vocabulary Understand and Express Emotions

What comes to your mind when you think of emotions? May be an array of feeling words that we develop naturally as we grow. But for children with special needs this exchange of receiving and expressing emotions is very daunting and can require extra ordinary effort. 

Many a times they are often taken for granted and their inner state is not looked into assuming they can’t understand or even worse they don’t feel it! 

But is it possible for any living being, be it humans or animals to not emote? Wouldn’t a child feel sad when their limitations are the highlight of discussion in any therapy session? Wouldn’t they have a need to express how they feel about things happening around them? Anyone would do and so would they!

So how do you make this complex barter of emotions slightly easier for them to understand?

In my clinical practice what has helped is using play along with narrative ideas to help children recognize, understand and express emotions when needed. 

Play not only makes it less intimidating for them, it also helps them see from a different perspective without putting themselves in the spotlight. It helps them learn empathy and feel for others emotional well-being as well. 

Isn’t it easier to explore anger through this (pic 1) than to punish a child for getting angry! Show me one person who doesn’t get angry? What's important is to develop strategies to express that anger.

 

 

















In pic 2 you will see discovery cards which can help children learn about facial expressions that different emotions bring to them. Isn’t it a cool way to see some really creative expressions build through mirror work?

In pic 3 you can use the board to explore different situations that bring emotions to them and how can they generalize it to themselves. 

By helping a child externalize and see situation from a different perspective they are able to generate possible outcomes that they can undertake in that situation. It helps them brainstorm and generate multiple possibilities for situations that seem very overwhelming.

It requires a lot of patience and respect for the child’s inner state to be able to facilitate him/her to identify and express feelings.

Do tell me your experience if you try any of these!

Games used:

Monkey Expressions by Chalk and chuckles
Look at me Discovery cards
Anger slayer by Toing

Aditi Chaudhary