As a redirection teacher I work with students that struggle with dealing with and expressing their anger and frustration. They often resort to physical acts of aggression or just completely shut down when they get upset. I created this visual to help when my students are angry but don't have or can't find the word to express WHY.
I know that there are typically three reasons that one student I work with get angry, it's either at another student, a teacher, or that he is frustrated with the work so those are the three cards I made. I put the words and visuals since he is a non reader (and I made one in Spanish as well because he is bilingual). When I see he is upset I present the cards and asking him "why are you angry" and I will read the reasons too if he doesn't choose right away. Then I show him the back where he can see he can go take a break or he can talk to me or another adult about it. We are always working on calming and not getting physically aggressive and if I can get the student to identify why they are upset it makes it easier for me to communicate choices with them, even if they are not communicating with me. In conjunction with this I will use an emotion rating scale so we can see how upset they are and track as they are decreasing their anger to know when they are ready to return to the class or back to work.
