How Technology Can Be Used to Teach your Child About Emotions

Kids feel emotions in extreme ways; they seem to be either ecstatic with joy, or throwing a tantrum. This is because they are too young to manage overwhelming feelings that they may experience.

They aren’t aware of the exact emotions that they are feeling, why they are feeling them and how to properly react to situations

It’s important that you help your children learn about managing their emotions as this will have a positive impact in many different facets of their lives.

According to psychologist Kenneth Barish“children most effectively learn to regulate their emotions when they are confident that their feelings will be heard. When a child expects that her feelings and concerns will be appreciated and understood, her emotions become less urgent. Because each disappointment and frustration now feels less painful, less “catastrophic,” she will be less insistent in her demands, and more open and flexible in seeking solutions to problems. She will less often get stuck in attitudes of blaming, argument and denial. She will be more able to feel empathy and concern for others, and to take responsibility for her actions.”

There are three main stages of teaching your child about their emotions:

  • Identifying emotions
  • Understand the situations that produce these emotions
  • Handling their emotions in constructive ways

When it comes to emotions, technology in education can be a really useful tool in getting your child to understand themselves.

Identifying emotions

You can use technology to help your child learn about the different emotions, and what they look like. There are a number of educational games that help young children identify what emotions look like on people. They can point out happy faces, sad faces, angry faces and anything else you want them to learn.

For older kids, you can use videos on the internet to teach them about emotions; such as songs about sadness, movie scenes where the characters are angry etc. There really is no limit on the technology you can use to teach children about emotions through technology.

Understand the situations that produce these emotions

Technology in education

It’s also important that you help your child understand the situations that produce their emotions. This can also be done with some technology.

While it’s probably best to teach them how to talk to you and tell you why they are feeling what they are feeling; technology can still be used. Your child can have an online journal if they are old enough to write, they can listen to music and watch videos that produce different emotions in them, and they can play educational games that identify these situations too.

Handling their emotions in constructive ways

The first way that you are going to teach your child about handling their emotions is all about setting a good example; try to not shout if you get frustrated in traffic, if they make a mistake try to speak gently and not fly off the handle, and don’t fight with your partner in front of them. You are their primary learning point and they will pick up on your habits.

At Miniland, we have a wide range of educational games that can teach your child about values and emotions, and we use technology in education to give your child the best access to resources for a well-rounded, holistic way to learn about how they can handle their emotions. Have a look at our product range for more information.