Throughout their time at St Peter's children will learn about their emotions and how to manage them through Zones of Regulation.

In Reception, we teach children to name their emotions and to know how they feel in their bodies. We learn that all emotions are OK and normal, but we need to learn to control and regulate ourselves. We talk about the 4 colours in Zones of Regulation. Blue, which is a state of low alertness. Green, which is a state of calm alertness with great control. Yellow, which is a state of heightened alertness, with increased energy but still some control. Red, which is a state of extremely heightened alertness with loss of control. We also start to teach the children some tools (regulation strategies) to put in their toolboxes of regulation.

I talk about my own emotions and the colours I feel where appropriate. For example, Mrs Mills is feeling a bit frustrated that the computer isn't working. I am in my Yellow zone. I'm going to take some deep breaths to get back to my green zone.

So far we have looked at the books 'Colour Monster', 'On Monday when it rained' and 'The way I feel'. We started by teaching the emotions and then, in later books, getting the children to name the emotion and put it in the correct colour.

First in our toolbox was our regulation station with soft toys, sensory toys and blankets. We have taught the children rainbow breathing, touching the floor on either side of us, breathing in and touching our hands above our heads, then breathing out and moving our hands back to the floor. We have also blown candles out on our fingers, by putting our hand in front of our mouth palm forward and blowing down one finger at a time.