August 2022 Parenta magazine

Feeling our emotions
From birth, children are experiencing
and expressing their emotions. Showing
anger and outrage at being allowed to
feel hunger and yet moments later, joy
and happiness as they nuzzle into your
warmth, gazing up into your smiling face.
However, despite being remarkably good
at feeling their emotions from a very young
age, children are far less equipped to
manage them.
The development of emotional intelligence
begins as a toddler when a child develops
a more stable sense of themselves,
as separate to the other people - and
emotions - around them. As this happens,
children seek to find their own place in
the world and along with this comes
some strong ideas about what it is that
they want. As they see some of the most
pronounced periods of development
and growth, emotional outbursts are not
uncommon. In ways that will not be seen
again until the teenage years when some
of the behaviour traits of our overwhelmed
toddlers are often revisited.
By the time children are around four or five
years old, their emotions are becoming
more developed. They are now moving
on from relying on adults to manage
their emotions and instead, look to solve
their own problems. They will now be
experiencing mixed emotions, such as
being angry and sad at the same time and
will begin to use emotions as unconscious
defence mechanisms. Along with this
maturity comes the ability to have simple
conversations about their feelings and
with guidance, they can learn alternative
coping methods when a situation causes
their emotions to rise.
By the time they are ready for school,
children can think about and discuss their
emotions in increasingly sophisticated
ways. This allows them to use cognitive
coping strategies, such as distraction or
self-talk as they think about how they feel
and learn to calm themselves. But this also
means they are becoming better at hiding
their feelings. Whilst this can be a good
thing within a social interaction, it also
means that you may need to look more
closely at their behaviours to see the
emotions that they might be masking.
To support our children as they
learn to understand and respond
to these growing feelings,
requires strategies of emotion
regulation. And this certainly
needs to be in place
before they can respond effectively to the
emotions of others.
It is very tempting to shy away from
dealing with difficult, emotional situations
but it is our job to teach our children how
to handle their emotions in healthy ways.
No one ever said a furious four-yearold
is easy but that is exactly when they
are ready to learn about how to calm
themselves down from anger and how to
manage it. Children are deeply passionate
about things and emotional outbursts can
become all too familiar before they have
learnt how to regulate the strong emotions
that are a part of growing up. If a favoured
toy breaks, a three- or four-year-old may
be distraught with grief. If another child
broke the toy, even by accident, they may
be furious and an emotional outburst be a
hasty and regular response.
A child’s depth of skill at handling these
situations depends on their ability to
monitor both their own and other people’s
emotions, to understand and label the
different emotions being shown and to
use emotional information to guide their
thinking and behaviours towards them.
But this requires permission to experience
their emotions in the first place, even the
negative ones. They need to learn how
to identify, understand and manage their
feelings, even when these may be causing
difficulties. They need to learn how to
regain control over their emotional state,
rethinking a situation and focusing on
reasons to feel happy or calm. All within
immature minds and bodies that might yet
be unable to relate to a time when they
did not feel this bad.
We all feel powerful emotions throughout
our lives and negative thoughts are a
necessary and natural part of this process.
However, if a tendency to react negatively
goes unchecked, a self-perpetuating
cycle can establish, impacting the way we
perceive our environment and interpret the
events of our day. Starting the day feeling
anxious can soon feel like everything is
going against you, with knock-on effects
until bedtime. The emotions we feel will
naturally translate to those around us,
especially our children. If you are feeling
frustrated when a child needs you, you
may model being short tempered and
dismissive, informing not only the child’s
behaviours and emotions but also their
developing methods of managing them.
Every time a child experiences the same
thoughts and emotional reactions, they
become conditioned to that emotion,
with less and less conscious control over
the emotional reactions they slip into. If
negative thinking repeatedly cycles into
negative feelings, these destructive cycles
will impact how a child thinks about and
perceives future experiences, affecting the
actions they then take and the person they
are becoming as they simply become a
part of who they are.
There are times when we all feel
angry. Trying to eliminate anger is
neither possible nor desirable. It can
be destructive, but it can also motivate
us to change our circumstances for the
better. Equally, happiness, joy and love
are emotions every parent would want
for their child. But to experience these
emotions unquestioned and unchecked
within some relationships could see them
staying in a situation that they would be
better off getting out of. But if we can focus
on the positives around us, feelings of
happiness can be constructively reinforced.
And with your children looking to you to
offer a sense of emotional direction and a
calming rudder to their less mature, often
fraught emotions, embracing a happy
emotional disposition is worth actively
considering.
This is the second of five articles from “The
Secure Child”. Next time we will look at
helping children to manage their emotions.
But in the meantime, bring focus back
to nurturing all of children’s growth and
development with a Nurturing Childhoods
Accreditation. A new approach to CPD
that is tailored to the needs of your setting
and the children and families you work
with. With its complete set of materials
and guidance, it is complemented by
resources available for your parents and
underpinned by professional standards
and industry leading research, as together
we surround children with a unified
understanding of who they are and what
they need, and really begin developing the
potential of all children in their early years.
Kathryn Peckham
As Founder of Nurturing Childhoods,
Dr Kathryn Peckham is a passionate
advocate for children’s access to rich and
meaningful experiences throughout their
foundational early years. Delivering online
courses, training and seminars she
works with families and settings to identify
and celebrate the impact of effective
childhood experiences as preparation for
all of life’s learning. An active campaigner
for children she consults on projects,
conducts research for government bodies
and contributes to papers launched in
parliament. Through her consultancy
and research she guides local councils,
practitioners, teachers and parents all
over the world in enhancing children’s
experiences through the experiences
they offer. A highly acclaimed author and
member of parliamentary groups, Kathryn
also teaches a Masters at the Centre for
Research in Early Years.
For more information and practical
guidance on developing the features of
lifelong learning, Kathryn has published
a book: “Developing School Readiness,
Creating Lifelong Learners”.
Get in contact at www.kathrynpeckham.
co.uk or email info@kathrynpeckham.
co.uk.
26 August 2022 | parenta.com
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