A craft activity can be a handy vehicle for teaching and consolidating cog concepts. In this example a Primary 1 group thought about the emotion word ‘happy’ (orange cog), spent time looking at and talking about happy facial expressions/behaviours (green cog) and linked them up to some happy triggers of their own (yellow cog) captured in the yellow petals of the flower.

Having laminated versions of the individual cogs to hand helps explain the rationale behind the colour choices and encourages use of the language.

We can often tell how someone is feeling by the expression that is on their face.
We looked through lots of magazines and cut out the faces of people that we thought were happy.
We stuck them down to make a flower, writing what makes us happy on each petal…

• Eating Pizza at Pizza Express
• Having Chocolate Cake
• Eating Ice cream
• Playing with Sophie
• Playing with Ellie and Hamish
• Playing with my buddy
• Playing with Daniel and Lawrence
• Going to Joe’s house
• People coming to my house
• Playing Minecraft

Thinking and talking about things that make us happy also overlaps with well-being and gratitude work.

We’re thinking this would also be a particularly nice activity to do outside while looking out for and experiencing all the things in nature that make us feel happy. Maybe with the help of a camera or sketch pad depending on who you’re working with.

Please send us a photo of your happy/gratitude flowers to hello@emotionworks.org.uk