Tips to help children refocus and calm down!

October 3, 2013 by

REFOCUSING – A WONDERFUL TECHNIQUE

Imagine this! A group of children who want to learn, who are calm, relaxed and receptive to learning.
Children who are having fun and being creative. Whose emotional energy state is stable and focused.
How can you achieve this?

Introduce ‘Refocusing’ into your dayrelax kids feet oct 2013

Introduce 5-15 minute sessions throughout the day, which are spent on helping the children to refocus and center their energy. Help them to change their hyperactive, scattered energy state to a calmer more peaceful one and be more receptive to learning!
This is time well spent for yourself and the children to recharge your batteries. This helps make your day easier and to flow.

How do you do this?

You can weave into your day short sessions of refocusing the child’s energy and attention by introducing Breathing and Body Awareness and Relaxation/Visualization exercises into your day.

For example at the beginning of the day or just after lunch when the children’s energy may be scattered you can use one of the relaxation and refocusing activities from Module one of the Rainbow Planet Connection resources.

For example, Activity 2 called ‘the Garden’ takes them back on a journey to a special garden where they feel peaceful and relaxed. A worksheet accompanies this visualization where the children can draw a picture of what they saw in their beautiful garden.

Or you can use techniques, which facilitate the release of pent up emotional energy such as putting the Feelings Cards around the room at the beginning of the day e.g. angry, sad, happy etc. You then ask the children to stand next to the one that most describes how they feel.  Then allow them to say why they feel like this.
This technique enables children to let go of emotional energy, and release and clear this from their body to become more receptive to learning.

You can use the activities we offer with the whole class over a number of weeks perhaps during circle time. Or you can use them with children in small groups. Some of the exercises from Body Awareness Module 2 involve teaching children relaxation and body awareness techniques to help them to get in touch with their feelings and where they are in their body.

They tune in to the colour and shape of the feelings and how these feelings are affecting them and their behaviour. They then learn how to breathe deeply and change the colour and shape to a more harmonious one if necessary.

This type of exercise works brilliantly with children (and adults) and I have used it many times over the course of my professional career as both a teacher and a counsellor. You can help the children and yourself get into a totally different state quite quickly using these methods.

You probably have children in your class who are challenging when it comes to sitting quietly and concentrating. They may even have lots of issues, which are causing them emotional hurt and pain. You can’t fix this for them but you can provide them with a wonderful school environment where they feel safe and nurtured. You can create a six-hour day for them where they leave behind their hurt and are present and open to learning.

Rainbow Planet Connection has lots of ideas and exercises you can use for ‘refocusing.’

Below is some feedback from facilitators who have used Rainbow Planet Connection’s Refocusing and Calming Activities with positive results:

  • “The children immediately took to the breathing exercises and many come into each class, asking when we can do our breathing/relaxation exercises. I believe the children are learning to exercise self-discipline and to self calm. I have to push them out the door when it is time for them to leave – really!”
  • With other groups ages ranging from 5-12 years:
    “I was really surprised to see how they identified with different shapes and colours which represented different feelings. I found this the most awesome part of the night; I didn’t realize how readily they would identify and label.”
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HOW DO EMOTIONS AFFECT CHILDREN’S BEHAVIOUR?

January 18, 2013 by

 

HOW DO EMOTIONS AFFECT CHILDREN’S BEHAVIOUR?

HOW CAN EMOTION AND SOCIAL WELL BEING MAKE A DIFFERENCE?

If a child is emotionally upset whether the emotion is anger, guilt, sadness or a range of other emotions, then they are not likely to function in a healthy way with regards to their behaviour. They may for instance express their anger by projecting it onto others as verbal aggression or violence. The other person that they project it onto may not have been the instigator of the emotion but an innocent bystander!

Children who have inner emotional turmoil are unlikely to be receptive to learning or responding in an appropriate way.

If you are working with these children it is extremely useful to have ideas and resources to help them express their emotions in non-violent ways.

I know that as a counsellor myself for many years, I was constantly looking for resources to use in my counselling role, especially ones that were interactive and fun.

WOULD YOU LIKE IDEAS AND RESOURCES TO HELP THE CHILDREN

THAT YOU ARE WORKING WITH?

 TO HELP THEM TO BECOME MORE SOCIALLY AND EMOTIONALLY HEALTHY?

We offer stimulus materials and activities to help to encourage children to open up and express themselves so that emotional healing can take place.

The activities we offer are based on the use of art therapy, drama, role play, dance and movement and creative writing to encourage children to express their feelings.

Art therapy for example, is a very useful and effective tool to use one on one or with small groups of children to help them to express their feelings.

Many children find it difficult to talk about their feelings but if they are drawing a picture it seems to put them at ease and they often begin to open up.

Other activities are offered which are based on inner body work. This involves looking inside the body to find out where the feeling or hurt is and then breathing it and/or doing other exercises to express and release the feeling.

Drama and role play activities are offered as part of our program and provide fun, effective ways of helping  children express their feelings and find better ways of responding to life issues.

WOULD YOU LIKE TRAINING TO HELP YOU TO IMPROVE YOUR REPERTOIRE OF SKILLS AND IDEAS FOR SUPPORTING CHILDREN’S EMOTIONAL AND SOCIAL WELL-BEING?

As well as a number of Activity based books we also offer an E-training course for anyone working with children and supporting their social and emotional well-being.

More about of this course

  • This e-course has been created to provide resources and training to encourage and support the development of SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE in children
  • Teaching EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE skills has been found to be a KEY FACTOR in producing happy kids with good self-esteem who are socially and educationally more successful
  • The Program focuses on helping children to learn how to manage their own emotional energy as well as how to be more aware of other people’s emotional energy and how it affects them
  • It introduces them to relaxation, visualization and breathing and body awareness techniques and teaches them how to use these techniques to centre and manage their own energy
  • Creative self-expression activities are uses throughout these sessions including games, role-plays, movement/dance, art, story telling and more, to help children to explore and express emotions
  • The program also helps to empower kids to deal with life issues such as bullying, friendships, anxiety etc

If you would like more detailed information about our resources or our training courses please go to www.rainbowplanetconnection.com

Or e-mail carol@rainbowplanetconnection.com

Written by Carol Wood

 

 

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Is there something missing…

November 30, 2012 by

Is there something missing in what we are teaching our children?

Based on the growing concerns that many parents and teachers have regarding children’s development, perhaps we need to ask ourselves this question!

Many of our schools are full of children who want to blame, tease and put other kids down. They continuously engage in power struggles and win-lose games. We still see the bullies and the victims.

We also see children who are sad, depressed and those who are ostracized by others.

Teaching children Social and Emotional Intelligence skills can help to address these issues.

If a child is in charge of their own emotional energy and response to others and learns how to take others people’s feelings into consideration, this will help to them be more emotionally healthy and generally have a greater sense of self-worth.

Exciting New Kid’s programs to support the development of Healthy Social and Emotional Intelligence Skills

We offer a program that can be used by teachers, child care workers, counsellors or other professionals working with children.

We would like to share a very interesting review from Barbara, a Yoga teacher in Canada who joined our E-course Training for Group Leaders and has been running our Kid’s program.

Barbara has been offering this innovative, program to 3 different groups of children over the last 5 weeks.

  • This program is designed to support and help children to develop healthy social and emotional skills.
  • It uses breathing and body awareness techniques to help children to centre and manage their own energy.
  • It also encourages children to develop healthy social interactions and more effective ways of relating to others.
  • Games and creative, fun activities such as art and drama form a large part of the course content

I sent Barbara some questions and here are her answers along with some other comments:

Q. Barbara why were you drawn to the Rainbow Planet E-course Training Program?

A. I have been interested in Social/Emotional Intelligence for many years. It was several years ago, now, when I first came across your website and subscribed to your newsletter. What you are doing and offering sounded so in tune to what I feel children need. I was not in a position to travel to any of the countries where you were offering the workshops so I ‘jumped’ at the possibility of doing an E-course. Thus far, I have not been disappointed.

Q. How are the parent’s responding to what you are offering the children in this program?

A. I hoped to attract 5 children with whom to do the assignments and was overwhelmed by the response. I now have 3 groups with a total of 20 children. PARENTS WANT THIS FOR THEIR CHILDREN. I have been asked if I will continue to offer the classes after this series end. I continue to get calls from parents who have heard through others about this program. Just tonight a parent came early to tell me how her son is using the information at home and at school. Yesterday he encountered a child who was in his personal space. He attempted to handle the situation but he was sent to the back of the room by the teacher so he would not have to encounter the behaviour that was bothering him. Today the same thing happened again and he stopped, assessed the situation and using a confident voice asked the child to stop the action that was irritating him. She did! The parent spent some while giving further examples of how the programme is working and how she too is learning to use the exercises for her own betterment. She also said her son is loving the classes. Truthfully, I have had numerous positive responses and much encouragement from most of the parents.

 

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