Give your children experiences that will help them learn the skills to manage anger, get along well with others, peacefully solve conflicts and prevent violent situations in the future. Make sure you do not lose control of your anger, especially when you are around your children. Remember that you are one of their role models for stress and anger management.
Relaxation Exercises
Teach children relaxation exercises to help them manage the physical manifestations of anger (such as higher body temperature, increased heart rate and faster breathing). This will help them calm down and feel less angry. Teach your children to breathe deeply first by having them lay on their backs. Then ask your children to place their hands on their stomachs. Teach them to breathe in to the count of three and to exhale to the count of six. Tell your children to make sure their belly rises as they inhale and that it falls as they exhale. You can also place a book on your child's stomach to help him breathe properly.
Do the "frozen solid" relaxation exercise next. Ask your children to pretend to become completely frozen by gradually tightening every part of their bodies. Then ask them to "thaw" by having them relax every part of their body to allow their anger to "melt" away.
Creative Activities
Have children draw pictures, find and cut out photographs from magazines and use words and phrases to visually express all the things that can help people to relax and thereby let go of anger. Ask your children to create cartoon strips illustrating situations in which characters have to deal with their anger. Have your children illustrate positive as well as negative solutions to anger management.
Learning About Anger Through Fiction
Read stories about people dealing with anger problems and discuss what the characters could have done differently to handle their anger and change the negative situations to positive ones.
Viewing Anger in the Media
Have children find news articles that demonstrate how anger affects events in the news. Talk about different situations that could have prevented these incidences. Have your children write news articles discussing how the news events could have been altered if people had controlled their anger. Watch a television show or movie that involves characters dealing with anger. Discuss how television and movies can affect how people handle anger, and think of ways you can emulate solutions the media presents for anger management or how you can come up with better solutions.
