However, the two emotions feel very different. Both emotions cause an elevated arousal level. For example, excited and worried both fall into the yellow zone. There are more specific physiological responses to each emotion. The emotions that fall into each zone have a similar effect on arousal.īlue zone is low energy, green is ideal, yellow is slightly elevated and red is extremely high arousal. What is your arousal level? In the Zones of Regulation, each zone actually represents a level of arousal.

This emotion-bots magnet craft can also be an extra fun way to do daily emotion check-ins.There are three components to every single emotion we experience.Try using this mood check-in chart to help children keep track of their emotions over time!.I often forget to do my journalling when I am feeling happy and excited, but it's good to appreciate the context behind feeling happy and express gratitude towards yourself for all of your moods! It's also important to do this journalling regardless of the type of emotion. Using a journal alongside the emotion wheel can be a really great way to unpack the feeling and understand why you are feeling a certain way.Encourage your children to use other tools along with the emotion wheel.Try letting your children color in their own emotion wheel to represent the emotions with colors that they connect with.It may be extra helpful to assist them with the new words when introducing them to a new emotion wheel. As kids grow up and become comfortable with their current emotion wheel, introduce them to the more specific emotion wheels.Set the example! Kids love to see and do what adults do, so using an emotion wheel of your own will help encourage your children and make them more excited to use the emotion wheel themselves.The goal is to make these emotion wheels a reliable resource for the kids so that they will turn to the emotion wheel when they are confused about their feelings. Create a routine! Incorporate the emotion wheel into daily or weekly routines so that your child feels confident using the emotion wheel.Start the process early! Getting kids used to the process of understanding their emotions early will help them feel comfortable using the emotion wheels and excited to take care of their mental health.Especially in a very confusing situation (for example, you don't know whether you are mad or sad) you can try to look at the specific emotions around the outer layers and work your way in to uncover your basic emotions. Sometimes it can also be useful to use the emotion wheel in reverse.First start by figuring out your basic emotion and then work your way out until you understand your more specific emotion. The typical way of using this emotion wheel is to go from the inner circle outwards.The first two layers are the same and the third layer further breaks down the emotions into more specific feelings. The final emotion wheel has three layers of emotions.There are two layers: the inner layer has the six primary emotions and the second layer breaks down those basic feelings into more specific emotions. Once kids become familiar with the idea of the emotion wheel they may want to progress to the second option.

All three emotion wheels contain the six primary emotions (happy, sad, anger, disgust, surprise, and fear). This is a beginner emotion wheel to get children used to the idea of trying to understand there feelings. The basic emotion wheel is picture based so that young kids can use it is a more visual tool to try and better understand there emotions.Below I've outlined how the emotion wheels work and some tips for helping children (or yourself) use this amazing resource! The Emotion Wheels I think it is important to introduce these emotion wheels to children when they are young so that they can develop a great understanding of their feelings and have amazing coping skills as they grow up. There are three options for the emotion wheels, that suit different age levels.

And having a tool to help us understand our emotions is very important. It is really cool, but also helps explain why it can sometimes be so difficult to know what we are feeling. The one thing I wish, is that I had discovered this resource when I was younger so it was only natural that I create a few emotion wheels for BrainFrame.įun psychology fact: our bodies respond very similar for every different emotion (whether we are angry or happy or any other emotion, our body will feel the same). I have used emotion wheels for about three years because they help me better understand my emotions. This is one of my favourite mental health resources.

Printable wheel of emotion