Glad Monster, Sad Monster

We ended up going two ways with Glad Monster, Sad Monster yesterday. One activity in the morning and a different one in the afternoon. Our speech therapist is out today and so because of the success of both activities yesterday, we wanted to switch them between AM and PM and do them again. This is how they went:

Emotional Charting (Tuesday AM/Wednesday PM)

We 'read' the story Glad Monster, Sad Monster by Ed Emberly  & Anne Miranda. We did this by holding each of the masks up that came with the book and following the pattern of the story but replacing it with scenarios we knew the students had experienced. For example, "The timer rings and I want to keep playing but I have to clean up. That makes me sad." "My parent isn't there when it's time to go home or the bus is running late and I don't see it. That makes me worried."

Then I asked each student how they felt that day and we charted it on our chart (as shown above). Talking about familiar scenarios had them thinking of emotions they felt throughout the day and so we got more the just "happy". We then counted them up and asked which had more and less. They they students picked what they want to do while they are happy and we sang, "If you're happy and you know it, (students selected)" as they went to grab their backpacks.

Emotion Labeling (Tuesday PM/Wednesday AM)

We 'read' the story Glad Monster, Sad Monster by Ed Emberly  & Anne Miranda. As with the activity above, we did this by holding each of the masks up that came with the book and following the pattern of the story but replacing it with scenarios we knew the students had experienced (for examples see above).

Then each student had a chance to roll the dice with the pictures of the monsters from the book on them (see picture below). Whatever emotion they rolled, we asked them what the emotion looks like or what they might do if they felt that way. Then we sang it to our "If you're happy and you know it" song:

"If your angry and you know it make a frown, 

If your angry and you know it make a frown,

If your angry and you know it and you've really gotta show it, 

If your angry and you know it make a frown."

We also emphasized that it's okay to feel that emotion, especially that it is okay to feel mad or angry. It's what you do that can be okay or not. It's okay to feel angry but it's not okay to push a friend. It's okay to feel angry and it's okay to say, "Stop that, I don't like that".
After each student had a turn, we sang, "If you're happy and you know it, grab your backpack" as they went to grab their backpacks.

We got the visual aides from this site: Making Learning Fun

For more information on emotional coaching, see this post: Crankenstein and Dealing with Emotions