This may work well if your child is capable of using their imagination and visualize the concept of a worry box. Why not create a display of the children's feelings monsters? You could use these Emotions and Feelings Photo Display Cards to support the children as they complete the sheet and display alongside the feelings monsters to further prompt discussion.

To start, I ask students to imagine what their worry would look like if it were a real-life monster. We talk about how imagining what the worry looks like is a starting point for talking to the worry. This might sound silly to some students, but I explain that when we can talk to our worries, we can tell them they’re wrong or that we want them to leave! I teach students to say, “I don’t have to listen to you, Worry Wilbert (or whatever name they’ve chosen),” or “You’re not welcome here, Worry Wilma.” A great book to review this process is Worry Says What? by Allison Edwards. Constructing the Worry Monster This activity helps students to develop self talk for dealing with their worries and recognize times and places that tend to bring out the worry monster. From here, we practice talking to their worry monsters and paying attention to time when he or she might come out. This activity really helps students to recognize worry triggers and employ that self talk that helps them to combat their worries! Colleen Wildenhaus is the mother of a 18-year-old girl who suffered from severe anxiety and OCD for most of her life. Today, she manages it well and is attending college as a freshman, something we didn't believe was possible given her intense mental health needs. Colleen's blog Good Bye Anxiety, Hello Joy shares with readers the journey her family takes to enjoy the small moments each day, keeping the beast of anxiety from taking away the joy of life. She shares real life experiences that have helped her daughter manage her anxiety and OCD as well as vulnarbale posts about what it feels like to move through these daily challenges.Place them on the inside of the box on the top and repeat for the bottom. You’ll want enough space to have an “open” mouth, showing teeth. Express their feelings by writing them on a paper (they can also make a drawing, or you can help them write it down) For all of us, dealing with worry required lots of repeated thinking about key issues. 8. Homemade Stress Ball Monsters

The idea behind all these activities is not that convince children that worries don’t exist. Far from it! It is more to get them to think about and process worry in a logical way. Using the box and writing down your problems on paper also helps to turn something intangible into something they can actually touch, work with, and control. In this particular small group activity, students each create their own unique worry monsters, choosing from different bodies, eyes, mouths, arms, and even legs. Some students make worry monsters that look quite scary while others make worry monsters that appear friendly, and that’s okay. In my worry management group, students create their own “worry monster” to represent the worries they have. They draw and name their worry monsters and verbalize the times at which the worry monster tends to come out. For example, a student might say, “My worry monster Harry comes out at night when it’s dark and there are noises outside my window.” So when I saw this amazing art activity from Liska at Adventure in a Box,I knew it would be great for worry group to teach students helpful strategies to manage worries. Lisa uses watercolors to make monsters, and I thought it would be perfect to make these while practicing controlled breathing. Worry Group Activity: Worry Monsters Teach Deep Breathing Tiny Baby Trouble tribb worry pets sensory plushies sensory stress pet keychain The Original Trouble Tribbs quiet critter worry buddyA growing number of primary schools in Brighton & Hove are using furry toys called ‘Worry Monsters’ to help children deal with things that are upsetting them or making them anxious. Worry monsters are just one of the 101 strategies in my book 101 Mindfulness Games For Happy Minds. You may well have heard of worry monsters – but have you heard about the many ways you can use them? Shirley Nelder said: “I was talking to a friend about charitable causes, and she mentioned the worry monsters. After showing pictures of them to my daughter, who works with children, we came up with the idea of creating a crowd of ‘cuddlees’, which we’d donate to Oxfordshire County Council’s social care team. I can’t thank enough the dedicated volunteers who, in their own time, have createdthese wonderful characters; each one so different and individual.”

When your child wakes they will see no worries left behind as the monster has eaten it and also you will be able to know what is worrying your child so you can help.

Keep collections to yourself or inspire other shoppers! Keep in mind that anyone can view public collections - they may also appear in recommendations and other places. Park feelings or emotions that they may not be able to cope with at the present moment until they are ready to deal with them. We’ll share a tutorial for a fun monster worry box in the next section, but let’s be clear, this technique is equally effective with any box you may have lying around in the house. Older children could of course write about their worries. Once again, when they are written down, they could post them into the monster’s mouth in a ceremonial way. 7. Return To Box Next Day Children either write or draw their worries on a sheet of paper, and don’t have to write their names down if they don’t want to. They then put the piece of paper in the Worry Monster’s mouth, and the worry monster eats the problem up.

Then take all the found food and store it in some ceremonial place, e.g. a basket or box, where it can be ready for next time you use the worry monster. Anxiety is a bully. It bosses your child around, tells them they are not good enough, and causes high amounts of fear. Suddenly, your anxious child begins to see anxiety as a part of them, bringing down their self-confidence and opinion of themselves. The best way to help your child battle anxiety is to name the worry monster, thus, making sure that the anxiety is seen externally. This process allows children to keep their own identify strong while externalizing the anxiety as the bully. This Canadian muggle might be a no-laugher (despite her energy vampire husband's jokesies), but Dyan's a fierce advocate for her two boys and passionate about all things hyperlexia and autism. Simply create some kind of worry monster. My friend Kelly’s daughter made one that looked like this: While the box is drying, cut the white foam paper to look like teeth. You can make them square or triangular. We chose the triangular ones.Leanne Manning, Oxfordshire County Council social worker , said: “I know one of the local children, Casey ( pictured below ). She loves her worry monster. It has pride of place in her bedroom, helping her and reducing anxiety.” She's an avid book reader, lifelong learner, and former piano teacher. She likes Toad as her Mario Kart driver and prefers to listen to audiobooks and podcasts at 2.8x speed. Her idea of a perfect lunch is nachos. You can frequently catch her saying, "It's Dyan, not Dylan. There's no L." Then secure them at the end with a rubber band or similar. You could draw faces onto the stress-balls with pens. Some kids may find it difficult to use visualization techniques and will benefit from using an actual box.