Emotion Coaching is ‘helping children and young people to understand the different emotions they experience, why they occur and how to handle them’ (Gottman,1997). Essentially, emotion coaching is comprised of two key elements, empathy and guidance (Rose et al,2014), which are expressed by adults whenever a child experiences an emotional moment.
EMPATHY…
…involves recognising, labelling and validating a child’s emotions, regardless of the behaviour, in order
to promote self-awareness and understanding of emotions.
Watch Brené Brown’s explanation of the differecnce between empathy and sympathy here.
GUIDANCE…
…is the process of engaging with the child in problem solving in order to support their ability to self-regulate. The child and adult work together to seek alternative courses of action to help manage emotions and develop more effective behaviour strategies.
Unlike most traditional behaviour management strategies that use an external framework, emotion coaching uses an internal relational framework for supporting children’s behaviour. A relational model promotes universal well-being, learning and behaviour and can be especially helpful for children with attachment difficulties or other vulnerabilities. The relational framework acknowledges that all behaviour is a form of communication and adopts a ‘no-blame’ ethos.
See our latest free resource to download ‘Emotion Coaching: A Summary’ for a helpful handout with steps and example scripts included.
For a more comprehensive look at emotion coaching as an approach, see our training course, created and delivered by Educational Psychologists Dr Eleanor Tomlinson and Dr Gary Lavan, this course will introduce you to Emotion Coaching, and guides you through systematically using Emotion Coaching in your school or setting to support pupils to understand and manage their emotions.
