Due to the pandemic a lot of children with disabilities especially children with emotional disorders have been struggling to cope with school, family, and peers. However, research shows us that effective Breathing Exercises For Kids can help us with our coping skills.
Breathing Exercises for Kids
Children who struggle with regulating their emotions have a harder time controlling them, resulting in outbursts towards parents, peers, teachers, and others. So let’s look at some breathing exercises you can try at home with your child.
Bubble Breathing Exercise – Breathing Exercises For Kids
Bubble breathing for special needs kids is a great intervention and one of the most popular forms of breathing techniques for therapists, teachers, and psychologists. What I love about bubbles are calming sensations and low-maintenance objects for any child to use on the go.
I have also used bubbles as a method inside my classroom to help children who suffer from sensory processing disorders sensory processing disorders. Although there are many different ways in which you can use bubbles to calm an autistic child.
Just check out this video below of how to get started on bubble-blowing techniques and you can add your bubble breathing style to what works best for your child.
Pinwheel Breathing – Breathing Exercises For Kids
I think we all have had or at least seen a pinwheel while growing up. Pinwheels are still popular to this very day and are a great toy that is very simple but effective for any child.
In this exercise, you’re going to have the child place the pinwheel front in the center of their face and have them practice taking a deep breath and slowly releasing their breath until they’re turning the pinwheel.
This is a great breathing technique because it helps the child control breathing. Pretty soon your child will be using this technique on the goal but with only envisioning they have a pinwheel in front of them.
Cotton Ball Breathing – Breathing Exercises For Kids
In this intervention, there are multiple ways in which you can do this exercise.
Method 1: Have your child place a cotton ball at the end of the palm and try blowing it to the tip of their fingers without falling off.
Method 2: Place a cotton ball at the end of the table and have your child try blowing the cotton ball across the table with their mouth or through a straw.
Method 3: Place a cotton ball inside a foam white cup poke a straw through the bottom of the cup and have your child blow the cotton ball out of the white foam cup.
Balloon Breathing
I don’t know any child that doesn’t like balloons but they’re a few. But when your child is comfortable around balloons this can serve as a great opportunity for helping children with anger. Balloon breathing is helpful for calming special needs kids down because it requires focus and determination to inflate the balloon to its full capacity. Try this intervention at home with your child.
Bunny Breathing
I learned about this type of breathing while practicing mindfulness in my co-taught general education classroom. This form of breathing technique for kids who struggle with anger and emotional disorders is a great way to cool down after a huge argument or tantrum. Check out this video below on how to get started on this intervention for kids with disabilities.
Conclusion
Of course, there are many other breathing exercises for your child to do at home or school, but the ones I listed above are my favorite and also very popular ones that Therapists, Teachers, Doctors, and Early interventionists use on the daily. Also check out these other 4 forms of therapies through music, art, dance, and movement.
