Looking for ways to teach mindfulness to your child? This blog post is full of clinician-approved activities you can do with your child.
You’ll learn great ways to help your child learn to control their emotions. These activities can help reduce symptoms related to anxiety, depression, and stress when practiced regularly with your child.
Benefits of teaching mindfulness to your child
Teaching mindfulness to your child has many benefits. These benefits include
Reduced symptoms of stress, anxiety, and depression
Reduced number and intensity of meltdowns
Help for your child to heal from trauma
Increased focus and attention span
Increased sense of positivity, self-esteem, and self-worth
Increased empathy, resilience, and self-compassion
Improved emotional regulation
Help your child learn the strategies in this blog post to stay calm. Mindfulness can help your child with focus, following directions, attention, and more. Meltdowns are less likely, too, as your child stays calm.
These ways and strategies are organized by different parenting situations. Feel free to scan to find the situation where you need the most help!
Mindful breathing techniques for any situation
Breathing exercises are a wonderful way to practice mindfulness.
Let’s start with some strategies you can use for teaching breathing techniques. These strategies are great for any situation.
Stuffed animal breathing
This is a great way to teach your child how to breathe from their diaphragm. Diaphragmatic breathing is a great way to help your child’s body let go of stress. This is a great activity to use at bedtime.
Have your child pick out a small stuffed animal
Have your child place this stuffed animal on their belly
Next, have your child take a deep breath into their belly.
As your child’s belly rises, the stuffed animal will rise. It is a great visual.
Next, have your child take a slow breath out of their mouth. Watch the animal drop.
Go again for 10 animal breaths
Bubble breathing
This activity can teach your child how to take slow deep breaths. The slower and deeper your breath in and out, the larger the bubble.
Get some bubbles
Dip the bubble wand into the bubble solution
Have your child take a slow deep breath in through their nose
Next, have your child blow out as slowly as possible through their mouth and into the bubble wand
Belly balloon breathing
Have your child take a deep breath in through their nose
As your child is breathing in, have them imagine there is a balloon inside their belly that is filling up with air
Next, have your child breathe out through their mouth
As your child is breathing out, have them imagine their worry is floating away on their outbreath
Shape breathing
Print out different shapes your child can trace with their finger
Have your child breathe in as they trace one side of the shape with their finger
Next, have your child breathe out as they trace another side with their finger
Repeat
Mindfulness strategies for stressful situations and anxiety
Here are strategies you can use for stressful situations and when your child is worried or anxious.
Progressive muscle relaxation
You start by tightening one muscle group and taking a deep breath.
Then you release and relax that muscle group. Try to become as relaxed as possible.
Go from top of head to toes. Start with crinkling and squeezing face muscles and releasing.
Active visualization
What we focus on right before bed can impact the quality of our sleep.
Start by having your child close their eyes.
Have your child pick a fun, happy, special place. This place can be real or imaginary.
Ask your child to describe what they are imagining.
Ask follow-up questions. You may ask your child to describe what the place smells like and how it feels, or what noises they hear.
Balloon let go
Try teaching your child to imagine their worries are in a balloon.
Have your child imagine putting their worry or stressor in a balloon
Next, have your child imagine the balloon floating up and away
Go to the next negative thought and repeat
Magic jar technique
This can be a fun art activity to do with your child. Your child’s creation becomes a fun mindfulness activity they can use in times of stress.
Create a glitter jar. You would want to supervise this activity with your child. Here is a helpful website for creating a glitter jar.
Shake the glitter jar
Set a timer for 2 minutes
Watch the different motions of the glitter
When your child’s mind wanders, have them bring it back to watching the glitter
Eye-spy mindfulness walk
Before going for a walk with your child, pick something you want to notice. For example, maybe you are going to listen and look for birds or the color pink
As you are walking, have your child take their focus away from what is worrying them and have your child notice the environment around them
Together point out when you notice a bird or the color pink or the object you were trying to find
Make it fun, have it be a game
Superhero pose
Have your child stand as their favorite superhero
Have your child notice how their body feels when they are standing strong
Have your child breathe in strength and breathe out worry and fear
Feel your feet
Have your child notice their feet
Ask your child how the ground feels is it cold, warm, or hot
Ask your child to notice if the ground is soft, squishy, or hard
Take some deep breaths and be in this moment
Use your Cadey app to watch other videos like this
Feel into it
Tune into body sensations to quiet mental chatter
Have your child tune into their fingers and ask what they notice
Have your child tune into their toes and ask what they notice
Have your child tune into their arms and ask what they notice
Have your child take a deep breath in through their nose and out through their mouth
Mindfulness strategies for strong emotions and self-regulation
Here are strategies you can use when your child is having strong emotions and struggling to self-regulate.
Emotion wheel check-in
It can be fun to make an emotion wheel check-in into an art project you do with your child.
Start by drawing or cutting out a circle on paper. Next, create at least 8 sections. In each section, put a different uncomfortable feeling.
When your child is feeling an uncomfortable emotion, have them find it on the mood wheel
Next, have your child locate the feeling in their body
Now have your child breathe into that space in their body
Your child can imagine breathing in peace, love, joy, or another positive emotion into that sensation in their body
Next, have your child breathe out the uncomfortable feeling
Grounding
Have your child stand up and feel their feet firmly on the ground as if they were a tree.
Have your child imagine their feet are tree roots, and they can anchor them deeply into the ground.
Ask your child if the ground is firm, smooth, squishy, cold, or hot.
Have your child spread out their arms and gently wave them around like tree branches in a gentle breeze.
Ask your child how the air feels on their arms. Is it warm or cold?
Have your child take a deep breath in through their nose and out through their mouth.
Have your child imagine their strong emotions leaving their body and going down into the earth through their roots.
Next, have your child shake the extra emotions off through their arms and the tree branches.
Throwing the intensity away
Have your child draw out what is upsetting them.
Now, have your child crumple up their picture and throw it away.
If you want to make it extra fun, bring out a trash can and make it into a game.
Now, it is time to move on to something else.
Watch Dr. Willard describe a version of this strategy in this video.
Squeeze and release
Have your child squeeze each hand.
Now have your child take a deep breath
Next, have your child relax and shake out their hands
Go for a mindful listening walk
Make a walk with your child into a game
Before going for a walk, pick something you and your child want to look for on your walk. It can help to pick something unique.
Go for a walk
On your walk, keep your senses open and see who can pick out or hear the most sounds of the item you picked
Whoever finds the most wins
Go for a mindful swim
Go to your nearest pool. Maybe the Rec Center?
Have your child focus on their arm strokes
Each time your child has a frustrating thought, they return their attention to their arm strokes.
Watch clouds
Word of caution: you are watching clouds. Let your child know not to look at the sun
Go outside and find a comfy place to lie on the ground
Next, with your child, notice how the clouds move through the sky
Ask your child, “What do you notice about the different clouds.
Take turns finding interesting shapes and pictures that are present in the clouds
When you get bored of this, just watch the clouds move across the sky
Mindfulness strategies around homework challenges
Here are strategies you can use when your child is struggling with homework.
Fear of failure strategy
Help your child focus on this moment.
Let go of sticky thoughts about what could happen or what did happen.
When a sticky thought enters your child’s mind, have your child say to the thought, “I can only focus on this moment. I don’t know what is going to happen yet.”
Now, have your child focus back on their work.
Procrastination with an assignment
Read through the requirements of the assignment
What is the why?
Create a word map or picture of the steps and requirements
Pick one step to start with
Set a timer for 15 minutes
Start with one small step
When the timer goes off, allow yourself to celebrate with a break
Come back and start another step
Next steps
Take a moment to pick the strategies you want to try first with your child. Some strategies will appeal to you more than others, and they are a good place to start. This post covers many different mindfulness strategies, so return here when you need more ideas.
As you work through these strategies, you will be learning how to incorporate mindfulness into your child’s daily routine more naturally and in the moment.
You will walk away knowing what to say to your child in tough situations. You will also learn how to incorporate mindfulness in a way that honors your child’s feelings and helps them overcome everyday challenges. Good job!
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