R U OK? DAY Activities for children Birth-School Aged
Updated: Sep 13, 2023
"R U OK? Day" is an annual event that takes place in Australia, designed to inspire and empower everyone to meaningfully connect with the people around them. It encourages us to ask, "R U OK?" and support anyone who may be dealing with life's ups and downs. This initiative is not only significant for adults but has profound implications for early childhood education as well.
Creating an emotionally secure environment is pivotal in shaping the well-being and mental health of children from birth to adolescence. Addressing this theme through
age-appropriate activities linked to educational outcomes underlines its importance and provides context for lifelong learning.
For Children Aged Birth to 2
Activities for our youngest attendees focus primarily on creating a safe and secure environment where they can explore their feelings.
For Children Aged 2 to 3
Children are introduced to more social activities, helping them understand the significance of asking someone how they are feeling.
For Children Aged 3 to 5
As children grow, their capacity to understand and express feelings expands. Activities aim to cultivate emotional intelligence and communication skills, still connected to the QKLG.
For Children Aged 5 to 8
We start incorporating My Time, Our Place (MTOP) guidelines to introduce more complex scenarios. These activities push the children to not only think about their emotions but to consider how to approach others who might need emotional support.
For Children Aged 8 to 15
The activities for this age range are designed to foster emotional intelligence, ethical thinking, and resilience. Aligned with MTOP, these activities provide more depth and complexity, preparing the kids for real-world challenges
Activity Ideas
Birth - 2 Years
Comfort Corner
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 3.2 - Children take increasing responsibility for their own health and physical wellbeing.
Materials Needed: Soft toys, cushions, soft fabric, feelings chart.
Instructions: Designate a corner of the room as a “comfort corner” and fill it with the materials.
Learning Analysis: Encourages the idea of emotional safety and self-comfort.
Extension Activities:
Add sensory items like soft fabrics or weighted blankets.
Introduce a "comfort buddy" soft toy that kids can hold when they're not feeling OK.
Mirror Feelings
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 1.1 - Children feel safe, secure, and supported.
Materials Needed: Handheld mirror.
Instructions: Sit with the baby and make facial expressions in the mirror to show different emotions.
Learning Analysis: Helps in the early identification of emotional expressions.
Extension Activities:
Use hand puppets to display emotions.
Introduce a picture book with faces showing different emotions.
Feeling Songs
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 5.5 - Children engage with a range of texts and get meaning from these texts.
Materials Needed: None.
Instructions: Sing songs that include different emotional expressions.
Learning Analysis: Helps introduce vocabulary related to feelings and emotions.
Extension Activities:
Use actions or dance along with the song.
Create a playlist of songs that discuss feelings.
Photo Flipbook
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 4.4 - Children resource their own learning through connecting with people, place, technologies, and natural and processed materials.
Materials Needed: Photos of faces, laminating sheets, rings to hold the flipbook.
Instructions: Create a flipbook of faces showing different emotions.
Learning Analysis: Enhances recognition skills related to emotional expressions.
Extension Activities:
Use the flipbook as part of a matching game.
Incorporate the flipbook into storytime to discuss emotions.
Happy/Sad Ball Game
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 3.1 - Children become strong in their social and emotional wellbeing.
Materials Needed: A soft ball.
Instructions: Sit across from the child and roll the ball to them, labelling each roll as a "happy roll" or a "sad roll."
Learning Analysis: Connects physical activity to emotional literacy.
Extension Activities:
Introduce more emotions like "excited roll" or "angry roll."
Use different textures of balls to match the emotions.
Age 2-3 Years
Emotion Stones
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 4.1 - Children develop dispositions for learning such as curiosity, cooperation, confidence, creativity, commitment, enthusiasm, persistence, imagination, and reflexivity.
Materials Needed: Smooth stones, emotion face stickers or paint.
Instructions: Stick or paint faces depicting different emotions on smooth stones and encourage children to pick a stone that reflects their current emotion.
Learning Analysis: Teaches emotional recognition and encourages communication about feelings.
Extension Activities:
Create a storytelling session using the emotion stones.
Add the stones to the Comfort Corner from the previous set of activities.
Emotion Wheel Craft
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 5.4 - Children begin to understand how symbols and pattern systems work.
Materials Needed: Paper plates, markers, a split pin.
Instructions: Divide a paper plate into segments and draw different emotions in each segment. Attach an arrow using the split pin.
Learning Analysis: Reinforces recognition and understanding of different emotions.
Extension Activities:
Use the wheel during circle time to discuss feelings.
Create a game where kids spin the wheel and act out the emotion it lands on.
Feelings Collage
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 1.4 - Children learn to interact in relation to others with care, empathy, and respect.
Materials Needed: Magazines, safety scissors, glue, large paper.
Instructions: Children cut out faces from magazines and glue them onto large paper to create a feelings collage.
Learning Analysis: Enhances understanding of diverse expressions of emotions.
Extension Activities:
Label each emotion on the collage.
Discuss what might cause the different emotions represented.
Feelings Puppet Show
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 5.1 - Children interact verbally and non-verbally with others for a range of purposes.
Materials Needed: Puppets, puppet theatre or a box.
Instructions: Conduct a puppet show where the puppets discuss their feelings and ask each other, "R U OK?"
Learning Analysis: Encourages verbal interaction and empathy through role-play.
Extension Activities:
Allow the children to conduct their own puppet shows.
Create a script where the puppets help solve each other’s problems.
Feelings Sorting Game
Curriculum Link: EYLF Outcome 4.2 - Children develop a range of skills and processes such as problem-solving, inquiry, experimentation, hypothesising, researching and investigating.
Materials Needed: Printed cards of facial expressions, two baskets labelled 'Happy' and 'Sad'.
Instructions: Children sort cards of facial expressions into the appropriate baskets.
Learning Analysis: Builds emotional literacy and classification skills.
Extension Activities:
Add more categories like ‘Angry’, ‘Excited’, etc.
Turn it into a team game with a timer.
Age 3-5 Years
Emotion Charades
Curriculum Link: QKLG - Building a confident self-identity
Materials Needed: Cards with emotions written on them.
Instructions: Children pick a card and act out the emotion for others to guess.
Learning Analysis: Enhances emotional vocabulary and interpretive skills.
Extension Activities:
Use a timer to make it more challenging.
Include props to help express the emotions.
Feelings Bingo
Curriculum Link: QKLG - Communicating socially
Materials Needed: Bingo cards with emotion faces, buttons or coins for marking.
Instructions: Play a game of bingo where each number is associated with a feeling.
Learning Analysis: Helps children associate numbers and social cues, boosting emotional intelligence.
Extension Activities:
Add more complex emotions to the bingo cards.
Pair it with a storytelling activity where the emotions come into play.
What Makes You Happy Jar
Curriculum Link: QKLG - Active learning processes
Materials Needed: A jar, small pieces of paper, pencils.
Instructions: Each child writes or draws something that makes them happy and places it in the jar.
Learning Analysis: Encourages self-reflection and awareness of what brings joy.
Extension Activities:
Make a "What Makes You Sad" jar and discuss coping mechanisms.
Read the jar's contents at circle time.
Feelings Faces Matching Game
Curriculum Link: QKLG - Positive approaches to learning
Materials Needed: Cards with emotion faces and words.
Instructions: Children match emotion faces to corresponding emotion words.
Learning Analysis: Increases vocabulary and emotional literacy.
Extension Activities:
Turn it into a memory game.
Create a feelings booklet using the matched cards.
Emotion Storytime
Curriculum Link: QKLG - Early literacy
Materials Needed: Books that discuss emotions.
Instructions: Read stories focused on emotions and discuss them.
Learning Analysis: Promotes literacy skills and emotional discussion.
Extension Activities:
Act out the stories.
Create an emotion-themed craft based on the story.
Age 5-8 Years
"I Feel" Journal
Curriculum Link: MTOP - Active learning
Materials Needed: Notebooks, pencils, markers.
Instructions: Children write or draw their feelings in a personal journal.
Learning Analysis: Encourages reflection and self-expression.
Extension Activities:
Share journal entries voluntarily.
Use the journal entries to create a "Feelings Wall."
Emotion Role-Play
Curriculum Link: MTOP - Social/emotional development
Materials Needed: None.
Instructions: Create scenarios where children have to practice asking, "R U OK?"
Learning Analysis: Builds empathy and social communication skills.
Extension Activities:
Include props and costumes.
Record the role-play for review and discussion.
Feelings Map
Curriculum Link: MTOP - Problem-solving and conflict resolution
Materials Needed: Large paper, markers.
Instructions: Children draw maps leading to places where they feel different emotions.
Learning Analysis: Connects emotions to environments, encouraging spatial awareness.
Extension Activities:
Discuss how to change negative emotion places into positive ones.
Create a 3D model of the map.
"When I Feel" Artwork
Curriculum Link: MTOP - Creative expression
Materials Needed: Art supplies.
Instructions: Create artwork based on different emotions.
Learning Analysis: Uses art as a form of emotional expression.
Extension Activities:
Create a gallery of the artworks.
Discuss the different art pieces and the emotions they represent.
Emotions Scavenger Hunt
Curriculum Link: MTOP - Active play and leisure
Materials Needed: Pre-made cards of different scenarios.
Instructions: Children search for cards around the room and discuss the emotions associated with each scenario.
Learning Analysis: Promotes physical activity and emotional discussion.
Extension Activities:
Include a physical challenge related to each card.
Pair the scavenger hunt with a storytelling activity.
Age 8-15 Years
Emotional Self-Portrait
Curriculum Link: MTOP Outcome 5.1 - Children and young people express ideas and make meaning using a range of media.
Materials Needed: Sketchbooks, pencils, colored pencils.
Instructions: Children draw a self-portrait that reflects how they're feeling.
Learning Analysis: Encourages self-reflection and emotional articulation through art.
Extension Activities:
Pair up children to draw each other based on how they think the other is feeling.
Create a gallery walk with the portraits.
Role-Play Scenarios: Asking "R U OK?"
Curriculum Link: MTOP Outcome 1.2 - Children and young people develop their emerging autonomy, inter-dependence, resilience and sense of agency.
Materials Needed: Cards with different scenarios written on them.
Instructions: In pairs, children draw a card and role-play the scenario, practicing how to ask "R U OK?"
Learning Analysis: Develops empathy and builds communication skills.
Extension Activities:
Discuss the scenarios in a group setting.
Record the role-plays to discuss effective communication strategies later.
Emotional Intelligence Quiz
Curriculum Link: MTOP Outcome 4.2 - Children and young people transfer and adapt what they have learned from one setting to another.
Materials Needed: Printed quiz sheets, pencils.
Instructions: Children complete an emotional intelligence quiz.
Learning Analysis: Promotes self-awareness and understanding of emotional intelligence.
Extension Activities:
Turn the quiz into a group discussion or debate.
Assign homework to research famous people with high emotional intelligence.
"What Would You Do?" Discussion
Curriculum Link: MTOP Outcome 2.2 - Children and young people respond to diversity with respect.
Materials Needed: Cards with various emotional challenges or scenarios.
Instructions: Children pick a card and discuss what they would do in that situation.
Learning Analysis: Encourages empathy, ethical thinking, and problem-solving.
Extension Activities:
Act out the chosen scenarios.
Create a 'response tree' showing different ways to handle each scenario.
DIY Stress Balls
Curriculum Link: MTOP Outcome 3.1 - Children and young people become strong in their social and emotional well-being.
Materials Needed: Balloons, flour, funnel.
Instructions: Children make their own stress balls using balloons and flour.
Learning Analysis: Teaches stress management and offers a tactile form of emotional expression.
Extension Activities:
Discuss other methods of stress relief.
Decorate the stress balls with faces showing different emotions.
Have a look at our Learning Outcome Activity Sets
This invaluable resource offers a wide array of play-based learning activities tailored to each specific outcome within the Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) V2.0.
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The QKLG supports kindergarten teachers’ professional practice in a range of contexts across Queensland. It adopts the vision of the Early Years Learning Framework (EYLF) that ‘all children experience learning that is engaging and builds success for life. Our Play based activity set assists you with hundreds of activities aligned with this framework.
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