🌱 Pause. Exploring anxiety and worry through a BOUNCE® lens
As a BOUNCE® practitioner, you’re not here to reassure anxiety away —
you’re here to understand what the nervous system is trying to protect against.
Anxiety and worry are not overthinking or attention-seeking.
They are signals that the child’s body 🧠, emotions 💛, and sense of safety 🤝 are anticipating threat — often before the child has words for it.
Before choosing an activity, pause and ask:
- Body 🧘 – What physical sensations is the child experiencing (tight chest, butterflies, heat, shakiness)?
- Openness 🔓 – Does the child feel safe enough to stay present with these sensations, or are they avoiding them?
- Understanding sensory differences 👂👀 – Is unpredictability, noise, pace, or social demand increasing threat?
- Navigating emotions 💭 – Are worry thoughts masking fear, shame, or previous overwhelm?
- Connection 🤝 – Is the child seeking reassurance because their body doesn’t yet feel settled?
- Esteem 🌟 – Is fear of failure, rejection, or getting it wrong driving avoidance?
Your role is not to remove anxiety —
it’s to help the child understand that these sensations are not dangerous.
Start with curiosity 🌿
Then choose the intervention that meets the child where they are right now.
🖨️ Looking for Printables
Choose these when the child needs help understanding anxiety without fear or pressure.
- Somatic Toolkit
- Communication Pack
- Therapeutic LEGO Activities
- Belief Systems: Lego or Minecraft
- Body based activities to explore where emotions are felt physically
These help children notice and name sensations, thoughts, and needs — without needing to “fix” them.
📘 Looking for Lesson Plans
Choose this when you want a structured sequence to build understanding over time.
- Emotional Literacy lesson plans, then explore this.
The focus is on recognising emotions early and learning that anxiety is a state — not an identity.
🧰 Looking for a Regulation Tool
Choose this when anxiety is active in the body, not just the mind.
- Explore somatic, body-based regulation strategies
- Support calming, grounding, and sensory balance
- Music for regulation to support rhythm, grounding, and nervous system settling
These help the body return towards the window of tolerance before any cognitive work.
🧱 Looking for a Creative Hands-on Activity
Choose this when worry is present but talking feels too exposing.
- Creative and expressive activities to externalise worry
- Symbolic exploration (drawing, modelling, mapping emotions in the body)
This allows anxiety to be explored without reinforcing fear of feelings.
🎓 Further practitioner training
If you want deeper understanding and practical strategies, explore:
Reducing Anxiety in Children
💡 Did you Know?
These, along with every course, resources, activity and idea are all free to Annual Professional Members and Team Members of the Learning Portal?
