Emotion Regulation Skills in Children

 Emotion regulation skills play a critical role in children's emotional, social and academic development, both in their current lives and in their future adult lives, and most importantly in gaining psychological resilience. Therefore, we, educators and parents, should support children in developing this skill in the most appropriate way.

Our children's emotion regulation skills, or emotion management in short, are directly related to parents' own skills in this area. In other words, for a child's healthy development, parents' own emotion regulation must be good first and foremost.

Emotions guide our behavior and enable us to make sense of the experiences we live. They are also necessary for us to show the necessary behavior according to the situation and to be able to express ourselves. However, when we experience our emotions intensely and out of control, it becomes difficult for us to think calmly and make sense of what we are experiencing. However, the most basic requirement for managing emotions is to have a calm mind.

Prof. Dr. Ayşe Bilge Selçuk examines this important issue in depth in her book “Psychological Resilience” and emphasizes the delicate relationship between a calm mind and emotional management as follows:

“If the child cannot calm down their mind because they have difficulty controlling their emotions, and if the situation that challenges them is not approached from a different perspective because their mind cannot calm down, and if they cannot regulate their emotions because they cannot do this, how is it possible to break this vicious cycle?”

Selçuk suggests 2 ways to solve this problem.

1. CHOOSING TIMES WHEN THE CHILD IS CALM TO WORK ON EMOTION REGULATION STRATEGIES

When intense emotions are experienced, doing such a study within a few hours after the event has calmed down, before the event is forgotten, develops the child’s emotional skill repertoire. Parents talking about what would be useful for the child to do or how it would be useful to think about an experienced event supports emotional regulation skills. Repeating such practices when the child is calm makes it easier to get involved when emotions are high.

2. TEACHING THE CHILD SOME CALMING DOWN SKILLS THAT HE CAN USE QUICKLY WHEN HIS EMOTIONS ARE TOO INTENSIVE

Sometimes, before we can put into action cognitive methods that help us regulate our emotions (for example, thinking of alternative explanations), we need physical techniques that will allow us to calm down biologically. In this way, we prepare the ground for cognitive methods by calming down first. Breathing techniques, using the breath correctly, being able to wait without reacting, mindfulness practices that allow us to stay in the moment are useful at these times. For example, stopping without reacting and counting to 10, repeating this if necessary.

We also find the subject of “The Role of Language Skills in Emotion Management” that Mr. Selçuk includes in the following sections of the book extremely important and we would like to include the curriculum that our school offers in its educational philosophy on topics such as reading, rich vocabulary and being able to express emotions in another article.

We recommend this wonderful book in our library to all new generation parents.