Calmer Choice Strategies to Try at Home
Calmer Choice is a non-profit serving children and those who care for them on Cape Cod and surrounding regions. We used evidence-based mindfulness practices to help children cultivate awareness, live mindfully and enhance resilience. During our 16-lesson elementary school curriculum, we give students opportunities for embodied awareness of their experience and teach strategies to use when they find themselves struggling. Mindfulness does not solve every problem and each person has strategies that work best for them. When using these strategies at home, it is important to always offer choices and it should never be a punishment. This is an opportunity for students to begin to learn how to help themselves.
| Strategy | How To Do It | Why? |
|---|---|---|
| Listening to sounds | Stop and listen to the sound around us. Closing your eyes can help, but not necessary. | Often our minds are stuck thinking about the present or the past, paying attention to sounds is happening in the present. |
| 5 Finger Breathing | Use the pointer finger on one hand to trace the fingers on the other hand. Inhale as you trace up, exhale as you go down. Go at a speed that helps your body and mind calm down. | Focusing on breath helps us be in the present moment and take a break from whatever struggle is occurring. It is not to push away the negative, only to accept things as they are and create some space around it. |
| Glitter Jar | Make a glitter jar with water, clear glue and glitter (fine glitter works well). Add as much clear glue as needed to get the effect you want. Shake up the jar and breathe as you watch the glitter settle | This is also a way to focus on the breath (see above), but uses a physical object and our vision to maintain our focus. |
| Breathing Sticks | We make these in grades K-2, but can be used at any age. Put 5 beads on a pipe cleaner and secure the ends so they do not slide off. Start with all the beads on one end. Put pointer and thumb on the first bead as you take a breath in, then slide the bead to the other end as you breathe out. After sliding all 5 beads ask yourself if you need some more, or if you are ready to move on. | Another way to focus on the breath with a physical object (see above) |
| Alligator Breath Rainbow Breath Hot chocolate breath Butterfly breath Buzzy bee breath Square breathing | These are just fun ways to focus on breath. We use them often with younger children. You can always make up your own breath! Alligator- hold arms out like mouth of a gator, open and close with breath | See info about other breathing strategies above. Also, the “buzzing” strategies creates a vibration that gives the nervous system some sensory input and can help calm down. |
| 6-7-8 breath 7-11 breath Apple, Banana breath | These three breaths all use the same concept- the exhale is longer than the inhale. In 6-7-8 you breathe in for 6, hold on 7 and breathe out for 8. In 7-11 breathe in for 7 and out for 11. In Apple Banana, say in your mind “Apple Apple” as you breathe in and “Banana, banana, banana” as you breathe out. | Having a longer exhale activates your parasympathetic nervous system, which is for rest and digest. It counterbalances the sympathetic nervous system, which is fight or flight. |
| 5, 4, 3, 2, 1 | This is a way to focus on your senses. Look at 5 things, listen for 4 sounds, notice 3 things you can touch, 2 things you can smell, 1 thing you can taste (this can even be the current taste inside your mouth- you don’t have to eat anything). This is great to do on a walk or out in nature. Encourage not rushing through everything, but taking time to notice | Our senses are always in the present moment. When we are upset we can get stuck ruminating about the situation. Using our senses is a way to ground ourselves in our body. |
| Gratitude | There are many ways to practice gratitude- write in a journal daily 3 things you are grateful for and why. Try to think of new things everyday. Share with a friend every day something you appreciate (maybe at dinner or bedtime). Create a gratitude jar at home that you add small slips of paper to and then then read them at the end of the month/year. | Gratitude is something we can practice to compensate for our brains negativity bias. This negativity bias is part of our primitive brain that is hard-wired to keep us safe, but sometimes we can get stuck in negative thinking when not needed. Gratitude can be an antidote- but it needs to be practiced regularly to get the effects. |
| NAME (for working with emotions) | This strategy is helpful for difficult emotions. Go through the letters to feel empowered by making a choice rather than reacting. After going through N-A-M you can make a choice rather than having a reaction. | We teach children that all emotions are ok- even the ones that are not pleasant. Sometimes what we do with our anger/frustration are reactions that are not good choices. By using NAME, you create some space for your emotions to be present and then can choose a response rather than being ruled by your reactions. Remember not to ignore the unpleasant feelings as they can get stronger when we try to push them away. |
| Self- compassion | We don’t teach this lesson until 3 rd grade but could also be used with younger children. This is an opportunity to offer ourselves words of kindness during difficult times, like we would to a friend. Steps: | We are often very hard on ourselves and find it much easier to offer compassion to others. When we are struggling we can be compassionate toward ourselves. Constant negative self-talk can have long term effects on self-esteem, health and well- being. |