The idea of these books is to help children explore their own emotions so it will be personal and meaningful to them. Everyone will have different ways of approaching the discussion book or completing the journal so there is no right way but it can always be helpful to share ideas too.

 

When completing the journal, allowing children to use their own interpretation is really important. It may not make sense to us or might seem like they are being silly about it but even just by getting them to make connections between their feelings and physiological experiences is a start. They can always revisit the journal at later stage and reflect, change, add to it or even complete a new one as they get older.

 

For example one boy I worked with recently said he felt shy in his knees. Instead of challenging it and trying to direct his thinking I felt it was important that he was just having a go and reflecting and value it as his interpretation of his own experience. Sometimes the first step is helping children realise that feelings do have a physiological link and value their interpretation of where that is knowing it can always be reflected on and refined later on. 

 

In the Gallery you can find a few examples of completed pages from the journal. If you have your own ideas and tips to share or your child is happy to share a page of their journal (annonymously) then please use the contact page and I will do my best to add them here too. 

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I have not published photos here on the website but we did take photos and drew what we saw and have stuck those in the book. This can help make it more personal to the child but equally using a mirror and drawing themselves is a really good way of helping them reflect on how they show the emotion with their face and body language.