Top 7 Anger Management Tips For Kids | Signs of Anger Problem

Emotion is one thing that is pretty difficult for anyone to control. Adults might control their emotions, but it’s quite difficult for kids as they tend to show their emotions right in front of people.

You may not feel worried when kids show positive emotions like love, happiness, laughter in front of people, but throwing negative emotions like anger, hate, jealousy will make you worried.

Anger is something that is commonly seen among kids from the age of toddlers to teenagers. You need to understand it's a normal human emotion. So being angry at your kid when they are angry will not help to solve your problem.

You should let your kid express their emotions, but if they are angry about everything, you need to understand, they might have anger issues. Parents are the ones who can help their kids if they are facing anger issues.

What is Anger Management For Kids?

Anger and aggression are considered negative emotions, and parents get worried when they see such emotions in their kid. Kids often show anger and emotion as they do not know what to do with uncomfortable feelings and frustrations.

In comparison to tweens and teens, toddlers and little kids have difficulty controlling their anger issues. You may have seen toddlers biting or hitting one another when they do not get particular things; both are fighting. However, if you do not help your kids with their anger issues early, they may have the anger issue even when they grow up.

Many people think that anger management classes and anger management techniques are just for adults. They even think that it is common for kids to show anger and aggressive behavior, which is false. If you cannot manage your kid’s anger issue at the right time, you may have to face several consequences as they grow up.

Anger management for kids is the way of controlling your kids’ anger, stress, and frustration. It helps you to recognize your kids’ anger and find a way to control it. By teaching a kid about anger management strategies, they can identify when they feel angry and how they can handle it. With learned anger management strategies, kids know about their behavior when they are getting specific emotions.

Anger Management Tips For Kids

You can solve the problem of anger management at home; you do not need to enroll them in an anger management class. Anger management classes are effective, but it would be better to solve anger issues at home first. Here are some of the anger management tips that you can use to raise a well-behaved child:

Deep Breathing Exercise

The first tip that you can follow is breathing exercise. Yes, this is the most common tip, and in fact, the most popular tip that people who have an anger issue follow is the deep breathing exercise. Deep breathing exercises fall under mindfulness activities to help kids control anger, taking just 1-2 minutes.

Whenever your kid feels angry, you can always ask them to take a deep breath. If this is the first time your kids are performing breathing exercises, then ask them to do it for a minute, and then as they get used to the exercise, you can increase their exercise time.

Encourage Physical Exercise

Physical exercises for kids help to overcome their anger issues. It is not an instant remedy, but it works for a long time. Performing physical exercise every day will help you to relax and keep you mentally healthy. The physical workout will help to reduce anger issues among people.

Kids usually skip physical exercise, eventually increasing their muscle tension and becoming aggressive, leading to anger issues. Exercise releases tension and other negative emotions, which helps them to overcome their anger issues.

Teach Anger Coping Skills

The next way to manage anger is by learning some anger coping skills. You need to identify one skill that helps your kids cope with their anger issues for this technique. Sometimes kids throw stuff that is around them when they are angry.

Instead of letting them throw things, you can teach them what they can do like paint, write a letter or speak about what's bothering them.

If your kids continue to hit people around them when they are angry or throw things around, this will never help overcome their anger problem. Teaching your kids coping skills helps to distract their minds when they are angry.

Teach technique of 1+3+10

The 1+3+10 technique is similar to the breathing technique where you need to ask your kids to take breaths and count. Whenever your kid loses control or feels angry, you can ask them to tell themselves “be calm” at first.

And lastly, ask them to count to 10, which will help to control their negative emotions. Also, while counting, ask your kids to count quietly inside their minds. This is the most effective method; even when my kids were kids, they still used it whenever they got angry.

Write Down Your Emotion

Another anger management strategy that you can encourage your kids to do when they are angry is to write down their emotions. Whenever your kid feels angry, you can give them a pen and a paper and ask them to write down whatever is inside their head; this will help handle anger.

Sometimes, this technique can backfire if your kids give a letter to upset the person. When kids are upset, they can write whatever comes into their heads and sometimes inappropriate things about the person they are upset with. So please ask them to tear the letter without showing it to anyone.

Paint It Out

Painting works just like writing; it will help you to express your feelings through colors. Many people, especially kids, find painting as one of the relaxing activities, so why not give some colors and painting paper?

If your kids are aggressive, it would be best if you put some colors and painting paper on their backpacks so that they can take them with them wherever they go.

You can even use different colors based on their level of anger; for instance, if they are feeling extremely angry, they can use red. And if they are feeling mild anger, they can use blue and so on.

Provide Self-Talk Technique

Self-talk is also an effective way of managing anger among kids. Teaching your kids to have a pep talk with themselves will help to overcome their anger problems.

For instance, whenever they feel angry, they can have self-talk like, “stay calm”, “control, control”, “it’s better to ignore”, and so on.

While using this technique, you need to ensure that your kids do not burst out of anger at the person they are angry with.

Signs of Anger Issues Among Kids

Sometimes, parents might not know their kids have anger issues, but when the anger issue gets extreme, it becomes difficult for parents to address the anger issue. Here are some of the anger issues that you must look for before it gets too late:

• Shouting for no apparent reason.
• Hitting friends or siblings when they have an argument.
• Ignoring what other people are feeling.
• Getting aggressive without thinking.
• Difficult to express feelings.
• Hands and jaw clenching.
• Sweating.

Things You Can Do To Help Your Kids Overcome Anger Problem

Kids learn a lot from their parents and take their parents as their idols. They copy most of the activities from their parents. If you have an anger issue, then your kids can have the same issue. So, if you want your kids not to have anger issues, here are a few things that you can do:

Lead By Example

You may not be aware, but your kid's anger and how they express it depends on how you express your anger. If you have an anger problem and show it by shouting or throwing stuff around, your kids do the same.

To manage your kid’s anger problem, first of all, you need to work on yourself. Only when you can manage your anger, will your kid be able to learn from you just by looking at you.

Be Aware of Warning Sign

Being aware of your kid’s anger signs will also help to overcome anger problems. You need to identify signs that your kids show when they are angry. Whenever you feel like your kids are angry, you can try to calm them to handle anger.

You can also teach kids how aggressive behavior can damage their image and how they should be controlling their anger.

Set Limit of Aggression

Most of the time, we feel like kids need to express what they feel, and your kid feels overwhelmed when unable to express their feelings. But what if kids start to show aggressive behavior in the name of expressing their feelings?

Just because they are angry and want to express their feelings by hitting others does not mean you can allow them to do so. You need to set a limit on expressing aggression for your kids by not letting them hit others, break things around them, and so on. Instead, you can let them express feelings through writing and painting, as I mentioned above.

Reading

Reading books related to anger, aggression, sadness works as an anger management activity for kids. If your kids are not into reading, you can join book clubs or libraries to encourage them to read.

When kids read books related to anger, know the consequences of anger, and ways to manage anger, they will learn to cope with losing control of anger.