About this activity
Twelve emotion words for young children: happy, sad, mad, scared, tired, silly, excited, surprised, proud, shy, calm, worried. The first four are the ones every child gets taught; the value of this set is the rest — silly, proud, shy and worried are states a preschooler experiences constantly and often cannot name.
How to use it in a session
Make the face and let the child copy it. Emotion words attach to expressions faster than to definitions at this age, and a child who can produce a scared face usually has the concept. Name your own feelings during the session — I'm surprised, that was silly — because incidental modelling teaches these words far better than a card drill does. Six minutes is a full pass for this age group.
What to listen for
Watch which emotions are recognised but not named. A child who points to the right face and cannot produce the word has comprehension without expression, which is normal and points at retrieval work rather than concept teaching. Notice worried and shy, which are internal states with no obvious face — they are the hardest here and the last to arrive.
Carrying it home
Naming feelings during stories is the easiest home practice available. How does he feel, and how can you tell, takes ten seconds per page and needs no materials at all.
Questions
- What ages is this for?
- Preschool through first grade, where emotion vocabulary is still being built.
- Is it free?
- Yes, all twelve cards play with no account.
- Why teach emotion words in speech therapy?
- Because they are vocabulary, and because a child who can name a feeling has an alternative to showing it. Emotion words sit in both language and pragmatics goals for good reason.