Help Kids Calm Down With a ‘Brain Game’

https://offspring.lifehacker.com/help-kids-calm-down-with-a-brain-game-1838625076?utm_source=pocket-newtab

Meghan Moravcik Walbert
9/30/19 3:00pm

The thing about toddlers is that they’re mind-numbingly irrational. It’s not their fault, of course. It’s going to be a solid two decades before those brains are fully developed and able to offer up true logical reasoning to the world, but still. It’s frustrating.

No parent enjoys the tantrum management that comes with raising little kids, but it can be particularly frustrating when a tantrum starts over a miscommunication. By the time you realize that when you said, “We’re not going to the playground until after lunch,” all they heard was, “We’re not going to the playground,” it’s too late. They’re red-faced and screaming, their brains are flooded with emotion and they can’t hear our words anymore.

Amanda, a former children’s mental health counselor and writer at Messy Motherhood, discovered a way to interrupt the emotion-flood: Have them play a quick “brain game.”

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However, before you can make a request like “point out five things that are blue,” you may have to do something to get their attention. They are, after all, wrapped up in their own emotions. Turn the lights off and on, jump up and down or make a silly noise. Then, ask them to play a game.

Depending on their ability, ask if they can find three things that start with the letter “c.” Or send them in search of four square items or 3 things that are soft.

Keep it simple, Amanda says, but get them thinking.