How To Help Children Calm Down

How to Help Children Calm Down
childmind.org/article/how-to-help-children-calm-down
Techniques for helping kids regulate their emotions and avoid explosive behavior
Caroline Miller
Many children have difficulty regulating their emotions. Tantrums, outbursts,

whining, defiance, fighting: these are all behaviors you see when kids experience
powerful feelings they can’t control. While some kids have learned to act out
because it gets them what they want — attention or time on the iPad — other kids
have trouble staying calm because they are unusually sensitive.
The good news is that learning to calm down instead of acting out is a skill that can
be taught.
What is dysregulation?
“Some children’s reactions are just bigger than their peers or their siblings or their
cousins,” explains Lindsey Giller, PsyD, a clinicalpsychologist
at the Child Mind Institute. “Not only do they feel things more intensely and quickly,
they’re often slower to return to being calm.” Unusually intense feelings can also
make a child more prone to impulsive behaviors.
When kids are overwhelmed by feelings, adds Dr. Giller, the emotional side of the
brain isn’t communicating with the rational side, which normally regulates emotions
and plans the best way to deal with a situation. Experts call it being “dysregulated.”
It’s not effective to try to reason with a child who’s dysregulated. To discuss what
happened, you need to wait until a child’s rational faculties are back “online.”
Rethinking emotions
Parents can start by helping children understand how their emotions work. Kids
don’t go from calm to sobbing on the floor in an instant. That emotion built over
time, like a wave. Kids can learn control by noticing and labeling their feelings
earlier, before the wave gets too big to handle.
Some kids are hesitant to acknowledge negative emotions. “A lot of kids are
growing up thinking anxiety, anger, sadness are bad emotions,” says Stephanie
Samar, PsyD, a clinical psychologist at the Child Mind Institute. But naming and
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accepting these emotions is “a foundation to problem-solving how to manage
them.”
Parents may also minimize negative feelings, notes Dr. Samar, because they want
their kids to be happy. But children need to learn that we all have a range of
feelings. “You don’t want to create a dynamic that only happy is good,” she says.
Model managing difficult feelings

“For younger children, describing your own feelings and modeling how you
manage them is useful,” notes Dr. Samar. “They hear you strategizing about your
own feelings, when you’re nervous or frustrated, and how you’re going to handle it,
and they can use these words.”
For kids who feel like big emotions sneak up on them, you can help them practice
recognizing their emotions, and model doing that yourself. Try ranking the intensity
of your emotions from 1-10, with 1 being pretty calm and 10 being furious. If you
forget something that you meant to bring to Grandma’s, you could acknowledge
that you are feeling frustrated and say that you’re at a 4. It might feel a little silly at
first, but it teaches kids to pause and notice what they are feeling.
If you see them starting to get upset about something, ask them what they are
feeling, and how upset they are. Are they at a 6? For some younger kids, a visual
aid like a feelings thermometer might help.
Validate your child’s feelings

Validation is a powerful tool for helping kids calm down by communicating that you
understand and accept what they’re feeling. “Validation is showing acceptance,
which is not the same thing as agreement,” Dr. Giller explains. “It’s nonjudgmental.
And it’s not trying to change or fix anything.” Feeling understood, she explains,
helps kids let go of powerful feelings.
Effective validation means paying undivided attention to your child. “You want to be
fully attuned so you can notice her body language and facial expressions and
really try to understand her perspective,” says Dr. Samar. “It can help to reflect
back and ask, ‘Am I getting it right?’ Or if you’re truly not getting it, it’s okay to say,
‘I’m trying to understand.’ ”
Helping kids by showing them that you’re listening and trying to understand their
experience can help avoid explosive behavior when a child is building towards a
tantrum.
Active ignoring
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Validating feelings doesn’t mean giving attention to bad behavior. Ignoring
behaviors like whining, arguing, inappropriate language or outbursts is a way to
reduce the chances of these behaviors being repeated. It’s called “active” because
it’s withdrawing attention conspicuously.
“You’re turning your face, and sometimes body, away or leaving the room when
your child is engaging in minor misbehaviors in order to withdraw your attention,”
Dr. Giller explains. “But the key to its effectiveness is, as soon as your child is
doing something you can praise, to turn your attention back on.”
Positive attention
The most powerful tool parents have in influencing behavior is attention. As Dr.
Giller puts it, “It’s like candy for your kids.” Positive attention will increase the
behaviors you are focusing on.
When you’re shaping a new behavior, you want to praise it and give a lot of
attention to it. “So really, really focus in on it,” adds Dr. Giller. “Be sincere,
enthusiastic and genuine. And you want it to be very specific, to make sure your
child understands what you are praising.”
When helping your child deal with an emotion, notice the efforts to calm down,
however small. For example, if your child is in the midst of a tantrum and you see
him take a deep inhale of air, you can say, “I like that you took a deep breath” and
join him in taking additional deep breathes.
Clear expectations
Another key way to help prevent kids from getting dysregulated is to make your
expectations clear and follow consistent routines. “It’s important to keep those
expectations very clear and short,” notes Dr. Samar, and convey rules and
expected behaviors when everyone is calm. Dependable structure helps kids feel
in control.
When change is unavoidable, it’s good to give advance warning. Transitions are
particularly tough for kids who have trouble with big emotions, especially when it
means stopping an activity they’re very engaged in. Providing a warning before a
transition happens can help kids feel more prepared. “In 15 minutes, we’re going to
sit down at the table for dinner, so you’re going to need to shut off your PS4 at that
time,” Dr. Giller suggests. It may still be hard for them to comply, but knowing it’s
coming helps kids feel more in control and stay calmer,” she explains.
Give options
When kids are asked to do things they’re not likely to feel enthusiastic about,
giving them options may reduce outbursts and increase compliance. For instance:
“You can either come with me to food shopping or you can go with Dad to pick up
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your sister.” Or: “You can get ready for bed now and we can read a story together
— or you can get ready for bed in 10 minutes and no story.”
“Giving two options reduces the negotiating that can lead to tension,” Dr. Samar
suggests.
Coping ahead
Coping ahead is planning in advance for something that you predict may be an
emotionally challenging situation for your child, or for both of you. It means talking,
when you are both calm, about what’s coming, being direct about what negative
emotions can arise, and strategizing how you will get through it.
If a child was upset last time she was at Grandma’s house because she wasn’t
allowed to do something she gets to do at home, coping ahead for the next visit
would be acknowledging that you saw that she was frustrated and angry, and
discussing how she can handle those feelings. Together you might come up with
something she is allowed to do at Grandma’s that she can have fun doing.
Talking about stressful situations in advance helps avoid meltdowns. “If you set up
a plan in advance, it increases the likelihood that you’ll end up in a positive
situation,” Dr. Samar notes.
Problem solving
If a child has a tantrum, parents are often hesitant to bring it up later, Dr. Samar
notes. “It’s natural to want to put that behind us. But it’s good to revisit briefly, in a
non-judgmental way.”
Revisiting an earlier event — say a meltdown at the toy store — engages the child
in thinking about what happened, and to strategize about what could have been
done differently. If you can come up with one or two things that might have led to a
different outcome, your child might remember them next time he’s starting to feel
overwhelmed.
Five special minutes a day

Even a small amount of time set aside reliably, every day, for mom or dad to do
something chosen by a child can help that child manage stress at other points in
the day. It’s a time for positive connection, without parental commands, ignoring
any minor misbehavior, just attending to your child and letting her be in charge.
It can help a child who’s having a tough time in school, for instance, to know she
can look forward to that special time. “This five minutes of parental attention should
not be contingent on good behavior,” says Dr. Samar. “It’s a time, no matter what
happened that day, to reinforce that ‘I love you no matter what.’ ”
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How to Help Children Calm Down

Many children have difficulty regulating their emotions. Tantrums, outbursts,

Model managing difficult feelings

Validate your child’s feelings

Five special minutes a day

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