Title: Breathe

Authors: Scott Magoon

Themes: Anxiety, Mindfulness, Coping Skills, Social Skills

Age Recommendation: Elementary School

Summary: Breathe is a great way to teach and practice deep breathing skills with young children. This short picture book follows a young beluga whale and his mom though some stressful situations, with prompts to "breathe" throughout their journey.

Ideas / Interventions: Before reading this book with clients, teach them to take deep, cleansing breaths; inhale slowly through the nose to expand their whole abdomen and exhale slowly through the mouth. Then, read the story together and when the "breathe" pages come along, practice a deep, cleansing breath together.

Teaching kids deep breathing skills is a helpful way to introduce mindfulness, plus calming and coping skills that support other behavioral management techniques. For example, practice deep breathing before teaching the Chill Drill, or as a healthy response to behavioral prompts like counting. There are so many fun ways to teach this skill to kids! Try blowing bubbles slowly, or the "hot chocolate" method, where they cup their hands together and inhale deeply as though they are smelling cocoa, and then exhale slowly to cool the hot chocolate down.