Tag: mental health skill building

Strong Suits™: A Game to Boost Social Emotional Learning

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Making Social Emotional Learning Fun

 Strong Suits™, a game for communication skills, engages young players in a fun card game. In it, participants identify and communicate their strengths, personality, and individuality. In addition, this quick and easy game builds mental/social-emotional health skills. These communication skills include self-confidence, resilience, self-knowledge, self-respect, and the respect of others. The game, designed for 2 or more players, works well played at home or in groups in the classroom. Along with its ability to work for camps and after-school programs.

This image shows an abstract illustration of a diverse group of people with different interests and vocations. Because groups are often diverse, a game for communication skills is not only engaging but critical.

Get Strong Suits™ in the new aws Studios Store!

Other social emotional learning activities and games currently on the shelves at the aws Studios Store:

  • “Circle of Community™” – a fun team-building activity that works well with groups or teams. The activity presents well in the classroom or in the home! “Circle…” shows teams/groups how to work together. This includes keeping conflict to a minimum. This gives groups/teams a better chance of reaching their goals or going for a win.
  • “Reframe It™” is a fun game that builds empathy and an understanding. In particular, it does this exploring child and parent behavior or why kids and parents do what they do! The engaging and interactive game offers players a chance to think about modifying their reactions to challenging behaviors. And it offers ideas on how to alter the environment for more positive behaviors. In addition, this game for Parenting Educators and their parent groups works with pre-teens and teens.
  • “DIY Hardcover Picture Book,” on how to craft your own hardcover picture book.

To purchase this and other activities and a game for communication skills and social emotional learning at the aws Studios Store, you will need to make a FREE Teachers Pay Teachers account. Anyone with a FREE Teachers Pay Teachers account can purchase materials at the aws Studios Store!

And be sure to Like the aws Studios Store, give me a Rating or Review or Ask Me a Question! Check it out here!

Reduce Your Anxiety and Boost Your Mental Health: New SEL Resources

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NOW OPEN! The aws Studios Store!

Parents, grandparents, teachers and educators!

You can count on the effectiveness of the SEL resources in the aws Studios Store! As a mental health educator and curriculum developer, hundreds of students, young and old tested and approved my activities and curricula.

Furthermore, I am excited to provide you with my most popular SEL resources and curricula.

Check out my new store here!

SEL resources currently on the shelves at the aws Studios Store:

“Circle of Community™” is a fun team-building activity that can be used with any group or team, in the classroom or in the home! “Circle…” shows teams/groups how to work together, keeping conflict to a minimum giving groups/teams a better chance of reaching their goals or going for a win.

Picture shows cover of one of the SEL resources at the aws Studios.art Teachers Pay Teachers Store
Another picture from an aws Studios.art SEL resource in the TPT store

“Reframe It™” is a fun game that builds empathy and an understanding of child and parent behavior or why kids and parents do what they do! The engaging and interactive game offers players a chance to think about ways to modify their reactions to problematic or challenging behaviors and offers ideas on how to alter the environment for more positive behaviors. Particularly, this game is for parents, Parenting Educators and their parent groups. In addition, it plays well with pre-teens and teens.

“DIY Hardcover Picture Book”:

A one-pager on how to craft your own hardcover picture book. Great for art class! Plus, it’s a FREE download.

Picture from an aws Studios.art picture book used for an SEL resource art project

    To purchase the resources at the aws Studios Store, you will need to make a FREE Teachers Pay Teachers account. Anyone with a FREE Teachers Pay Teachers account can purchase materials at the aws Studios Store!

    Like the aws Studios Store, give me a Rating or Review or Ask Me a Question! Check it out here!

    Swept into Mental Illness? Assess Your Mental Health

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    Beware the media!

    aws Studios is all about helping you have mental health! Saturated with issues of “mental health,” the media is often reporting on mental illness and its treatment,  not mental health. At large, the focus on anything related to mental health is actually a focus on the “downstream” area of mental health – the place where mental health becomes illness requiring treatment. At aws Studios, the focus is upstream, on your mental health skills not mental illness!

    Upstream? Downstream? What Does it Mean?

    This image of a river running in front of a mountain illustrates the public health concept of catching health problems early - upstream - before they become more dangerous and costly downstream.
    From the NYS Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services, Albany, NY circa 2011. Artist unknown (if it’s yours, I’d love to know and give you credit)!

    In explaining the overall health of people in a community,  this parable about a river “slowly filling with drowning people” (representing illness) is often used. Due to their overwhelming numbers, many are unsavable. They are the end of the river, in the “downstream.” By taking a look “upstream,” we can see what is getting them into the water unable to save themselves in the first place — do they need lifejackets or, better yet, swimming lessons or a fence to keep them slipping into the river, etc.?

    If we use this parable to represent mental health, there are actions that, for the most part, could prevent “overwhelming numbers” of “drowning people” or mental illness. For some, mental illness is inevitable due to genetics. But for most, mental illness can be prevented and reduced or “cured” for those experiencing its symptoms. The upstream area of mental illness includes acquiring and maintaining the skills associated with mental health and implementing and enforcing policies that support both mental health and skill building.

    How are Your Mental Health Skills?

    The skills of mental health or social-emotional learning include self-management, relationships, and resource management:

    Self-Management:

    is the development of self-awareness and self-management skills such as the ability to take care of ourselves, building and maintaining resilience and identifying and managing our feelings or emotions.

    Relationships:

    include the development of healthy relationships to promote mental health such as building and maintaining communication skills, skills of empathy, compassion and acceptance and the ability to express gratitude and forgiveness.

    Resource management:

    Is to know what, when, where and how to ask for help for yourself and others.

    So, what do you think? How are your mental health skills? Do you have them down pat or might they need a little tweaking? Like all areas of health, our mental health will take a bit of managing and checking in on, on an ongoing basis.

    Check out the aws Studios mental health skill building activities here and give your mental health a boost today!

    Reframe It!™: A Game for Parents Looking to Solve Behavior Problems

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    Reframe It!™ game reduces anxiety and boosts social emotional mental health!

    Reframing is a social-emotional mental health tool or strategy that helps to understand the function of human behavior. The American Psychology Association defines reframing as “a process of reconceptualizing a problem by seeing it from a different perspective.” This, then, creates possibilities for parents and others to solve child problem behaviors. Reframing shows how to foresee behavior and bypass it while building empathy and reducing anxiety.

    As a parent, I loved learning about reframing. It showed me ways to try to get to the source of my child’s behavior problems. I was able to predict what might happen and diffuse their triggers.  It also helped me improve relationships with family members and friends. Reframing showed me how by to see behaviors from another’s perspective.  I enjoyed learning and teaching reframing so much that I developed “Reframe It!™,”* a game that teaches reframing. It shows a way to see why children or adults behave the way they do. The games also helps to build compassion for others and ourselves.

    Reframe It!™ is a fun game!

    “Reframe It!™” is a game for parents and others who are parenting to help them understand child behavior and behavior problems. The game can also help parents understand their own behavior, building self-compassion.  With reframing, we gain an understanding of “the function of behavior,” or why people – children and adults – do what they do.

    An aws Studios.art cartoon illustration showing a bunch of celery reframing two onions with behavior problems

    Reframe It!™ offers players:

    • A chance to think about ways to modify their reactions to challenging or problem behaviors
    • Ways to predict difficult behaviors and then
    • Make changes to the environment or situation to bypass potential problems.
    • For example:

    A parent learns that sibling conflicts often arise from children seeking attention or they are bored or jealous. The parent sees the connection and plans ahead to give each child positive attention regularly. Or they change the environment by helping the child engage in a personally stimulating activity.

    Reframe It!™ objectives include helping parents:

    • Learn about reframing.
    • Learn how to reframe behaviors to understand the function of behavior.
    • Begin a practice of reframing to help plan for and modify behavior/reactions and the environment.
    • Build empathy.
    • Build an understanding of personal behavior and “why we do what we do.”
    • Enter into discussions about behavior, stress, family roles, tasks, conflict or anger management, etc.
    • Increase comfort in communicating with each other.
    • Improve parent-child communication.

    More about reframing here, here and here!

    Click here to purchase Reframe It!, a downloadable pdf for $12.00

    * Reframe It!™ is a trademark of aws Studios and was developed using the child and parent behavior reframes in Intervening with troubled families: Functional family therapy and Parenting Wisely. D.A. Gordon, author. 2003.

    A Mental Health Toolbox for Social and Emotional Health and Well-being

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    Even if you are at risk for mental illness, you can maintain your social and emotional well-being by learning and practicing mental health skills.

    At the 2022 Mental Health America conference last week, “Forward Together – Recovery, Healing, Hope,” Kristen Harootunian, a young adult from Minding Your Mind, told a powerful and hopeful “story” titled, “Changing Minds: Stories Over Stigma.” Kristen related her experience with health, mental illness, substance abuse, and her subsequent recovery.

    Mental Health Toolbox

    • First, young people should connect with 1-3 trusted adults. They could be parents, teachers, counselors, clergy, family members, or friends.
    • “Letting people in and meeting help halfway”:  Kristen talked about how she thought she had to do things on her own and was alone in her struggles. When she opened up to her friends, she wasn’t expecting their support. Instead, they listened and gave her love and compassion. In therapy, Kristen found she wasn’t alone – that many young people deal with struggles similar to hers. Getting help with her emotional health or “letting people in” was what she needed to survive.
    A grumpy onion. He could use a toolbox!

    Five positive coping skills

    • Kristen’s five positive coping skills:
      • Exercise,
      • Walking,
      • Reading,
      • Connecting with family and friends
      • Journaling: When asked how she was doing, Kristen usually responded with, “I’m fine.” But actually, she was hiding or masking her true feelings. Writing or journaling helped her express her feelings, including guilt (of her mother’s death), shame, substance abuse, pressure, isolation, emptiness, trauma, anxiety, sadness, guardedness, grief, and tiredness. Getting these feelings down on paper helped her work through them and, for the most part, out of them.
    Looks like a trusted bunch of celery?

    How about you?

    Creating a toolbox of mental health skills isn’t difficult. It’s easy and can be a fun use of time. How about you? Do you have a toolbox of skills to help you maintain your mental health? Are they like the tools in Kristen’s box, or are they different? I would love to hear about what’s in your toolbox in the Comments section below!

    Thanks for tuning in, and feel free to share this post to help boost mental health skill-building everywhere!

    “Square breathing or box breathing,” a technique to help calm our bodies and brains down when starting to feel anxious:  4 beats inhale, 4 beats hold, 4 beats exhale, 4 beats hold, and repeat.

    Kristen says these tools help her maintain her recovery, but, as she alludes in her presentation, they would have been helpful to know at an early age to provide strategies to protect against mental illness. 

    Chill Kits! Helping kids and adults develop mental health / social emotional skills

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    Have Fun while Boosting Mental Health

    aws Studios is all about helping kids and adults build mental health skills (often referred to as social emotional learning [SEL] or skills)! This past Saturday, at the Golisano Children’s Hospital Run and Stroll fundraiser in Rochester, NY, I picked up the University of Rochester Medicine’s Pediatric Behavioral Health and Wellness “Coping Kit.”  It was full of excellent mental health skill-building resources meant for kids, but adults can use these kits too or get ideas of what they would want or need in their kits. They are guaranteed to add fun and easy ways to build your mental health.

    (I like “Chill Kits” instead of “Coping.”  I think “Chill” is a little more fun and not as “heavy” as “Coping.”  Heaven knows, we need to make mental health skill-building as fun as possible!)

    Coping or Chill Kit contents:

    • A cute, small vial of bubbles and a “Bubble Breathing” handout teaching the skill of deep, slow breathing to help us calm down when feeling upset using the bubbles.
    • A colorful handout of fun and easy yoga poses for kids from “Kids Yoga Stories.”
    • Another handout explaining the four (4) benefits of physical activity for kids’ mental health or “emotional wellness”:  1) Exercise fights depression; 2) Decreases stress; 3) Increases self-confidence; and can 4) Improve sleep. Who doesn’t need all of this?! So, to help kids get out there and move, the kit also included:
      • A fun, colorful jump rope
      • A Stress ball
      • A Mini plastic frisbee and a foldable fabric frisbee (or cooling fan)
    • And some sports stickers to top it all off.

    Thanks to UR Medicine

    Thank you to the UR Medicine’s Pediatric Behavioral Health and Wellness department and their “Coping” or “Chill Kit”! I made my granddaughter get her own! I wanted mine all to myself!

    Easy DIY Kit

    Everyone needs a “Chill Kit”! Do you have one? You could make your own. What would you put in yours? (I was thinking for adults, crayons and a coloring book!) Tell me what you think in Comments below!

    Do you like what you are reading? Do you think someone you know could benefit from this post? Help me spread the word about boosting mental health skills!

    Back To Basics: Practical Mental Health Information

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    aws Studios is proud to celebrate May as Mental Health Month! The following is an article from Mental Health America:

    Mental Health Awareness

    Since the start of the pandemic, more people are talking about mental health. An increasing number of folks are starting to see it for what it is: one important component of your overall health and well-being, just like your physical health. But mental health conditions, resources, and conversations can still feel complicated and out of reach.

    An image of an applique of hikers resting and viewing the distant mountain landscape signifying the importance of self-care, rest and relaxation for mental health.

    Be Informed


    Are there common warning signs for mental health conditions or crises? Specific factors that can lead to mental health conditions or even crises? What resources are out there – and how do I know if they’re right for me?

    another image signifying the importance of rest and relaxation with an abstract collage of a beach scene with sand, waves, beach chairs and umbrellas.

    Many people are learning about mental health topics for the first time. Having a widespread understanding of the topic can help you be more informed if you or someone you know is experiencing a mental health condition or crisis. Around half of people in the U.S. will meet the criteria for a diagnosable mental health condition at some point in their life, so everyone should know what to look out for.

    Everyone should have the support needed to thrive. Communities that have been historically and presently oppressed face a deeper mental health burden because of the added impact of trauma, oppression, and harm. There’s often no one single cause for a mental health condition. Instead, there are many possible risk factors that can influence how likely a person is to experience a mental health condition or how serious the symptoms may be.

    Know the Risk Factors


    Some risk factors for mental health conditions include: trauma, which can be a one-time event or ongoing; your environment and how it impacts your health and quality of life (also known as social determinants of health like financial stability and health care access); genetics; brain chemistry; and your habits and lifestyle such as a lack of sleep.

    An image of pool water signifying importance of bringing calm and beauty into our lives for better mental health.

    Questions to ask yourself

    Of course, understanding the risk factors for a mental health condition can be more difficult when it’s your own mental health. Take time to ask yourself about your thoughts, feelings, and behaviors to see if this is part of a pattern that may be caused by a mental health condition. Here are some questions to get you started:


    • Have things that used to feel easy started feeling difficult?
    • Does the idea of doing daily tasks like making your bed now feel really, really hard?
    • Have you lost interest in activities and hobbies you used to enjoy?
    • Do you feel irritated, possibly to the point of lashing out at people you care about?

    Our society focuses much more on physical health than mental health, but both are equally important. If you are concerned about your mental health, there are several options available. You are not alone – help is out there, and recovery is possible. It may be hard to talk about your concerns, but simply acknowledging to yourself that you’re struggling is a really big step.

    Mental Health Awareness Resources


    Taking a screen at mhascreening.org can help you to better understand what you are experiencing and get helpful resources. After that, consider talking to someone you trust about your results, and seek out a professional to find the support you need.

    While you may not need this information today, knowing the basics about mental health will mean you’re prepared if you ever need it. Go to mhanational.org/may to learn more.