Sesame Workshop: Wes and Elijah go Heart to Heart
Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
In the video Wes and Elijah go Heart to Heart, Sesame Workshop shows how moments of connection can help to create a warm, supportive emotional space for you and your child.
In this video, the characters Wes and Elijah (Wes’ dad) practice ‘co-regulation’, a practice of “tuning into your child’s needs, offering them what they need, and finding ways to connect that soothe both of you. They’re demonstrating how close physical contact with safe and trusted adults is so valuable to young children and their caring grown-ups.”
The accompanying article notes that a comforting strategy, such as taking deep breaths and sharing a good, long hung, helps model and teach self-regulation and has benefits for both participants, commenting that research has demonstrated that “we benefit the most from hugs that last at least six seconds”.
Resting and slowing the down the body helps a child connect with sensations and manage big feelings. These shared practices also remind the child that the adult cares about their feelings.
The article suggests a simple strategy that can be incorporated during everyday routines, whenever a child needs to re-ground themself.
Invite your child to rest their head on your belly as a pillow. Gently lie on your back. You can both close your eyes if you wish. Then, both of you take a deep breath in through your nose, out through your mouth. Take two more breaths. Open your eyes and sit up slowly.
Kindercare.com also offers a group of Deep Breathing exercises that help children to calm down and also to prepare for sleep. The exercises use vivid imagery to appeal to the child’s imagination and enjoy the practices. The article recommends letting the child use their favourite, use when needed and repeat until the child starts to feel calm, or at least settle down enough to talk about their feelings.
Flower Breath: Imagine smelling a flower. Breathe in through your nose, out through your mouth.
Bunny Breath: Take three quick sniffs through the nose and one long exhale through the nose, gradually letting the exhale get slower and slower.
Snake Breath: Inhale slowly through the nose and breathe out through the mouth with a long, slow hissing sound.
Blow out the Candle: Imagine a birthday candle. Take in a deep breath through the nose and then exhale through the mouth to blow out the candle.
The article advises to introduce these ideas when your child is happy and calm, and then add the exercise they like best to play time, e.g. by drawing cupcakes and blowing out crayon candles, or hopping around the house like bunnies. Doing the exercises together helps model the steps, but also helps both parent and child find a calmer space in which to talk about feelings and maybe share a hug.
Modelling controlled, slow breathing is also helpful when putting a child to bed. Cuddling together, and maybe reading a story, if the parent practices controlled breathing the child will pick up on the parent’s increasingly relaxed state and will automatically start to regulate their own breathing to match that of the parent who is cuddling them, thus easing towards readiness for sleep. (Just be aware that you may find yourself drifting off as well, especially after a long, busy day!)