Emotions can be a difficult thing to understand – no matter what age you are. We teach kids about feelings early on, but we often teach them in very simple terms. Kids can recognize early on if they are happy, sad, or angry. But what about the times that they feel more than one thing at once? Today I am sharing a fun picture book about emotions that introduces kids to the possibility of feeling multiple things at once.

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I’m Happy-Sad Today was written by Lory Britain and illustrated by Matthew Rivera. This colorful book follows a young girl as she explains many of the situations in her life that have caused her to feel more than one emotion at once. Whether she is both excited and scared, or sad and mad, she recognizes that it is possible to feel many things at the same time. The situations she faces are ones that most kids will also face, making it easier to relate to the story.

Emotion Blocks

I created these printable emotions blocks to use while we explored conflicting emotions. You can download and print your own here. Fold along the lines and create a cube shape, tucking in the tabs and using glue or tape to attach them.

Check out this printable Calm Down Kit for Kids!

New Words

The little girl in the story combines her emotions to create new words. This was perhaps my daughter’s favorite part of the story. We rolled the cubes and tried to come up with new words to combine the emotions that appeared on top. We used a wipe off board and markers to mix the words up and try new combinations. This has given us a new vocabulary for discussing how we are feeling when we have mixed up emotions.

Emotions Dance

Another fun activity from the story that we brought to life was the emotions dance. In the story, the young girl likes to act out her emotions through dance. We are always happy for any excuse to dance and move, so we used our cubes to suggest emotions to dance out. This is a good way to get moving, and think about how we express our feelings through movement.

Related Post: Teach Kids about Feelings with the Moodsters

Creating Two Pictures

In the story, the young girl takes the opportunity to express her mashed up feelings through artwork. She uses each hand to paint a feeling at the same time. We decided to try this out for ourselves. We rolled our emotions cubes and used each hand to draw a different emotion on the cube. Instead of paint, we used chalk, but you can use any art supplies you have on hand. This not only gave us a chance to find ways to express different emotions visually, but also worked on dexterity.

Act It Out

This book provided us with a great opportunity to play some emotions charades. It’s important for kids to learn how to read the body language of others, and how their own emotions can show through their facial expressions and body language. We each rolled an emotion cube and acted out the feeling on top, then guessed what the other person was doing.

Do you have a favorite picture book about emotions? Share in the comments below so we can add to our collection!

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