SEL picture books to read about overcoming Anxiety and Fear
Social Emotional Learning ( SEL) is a popular and much needed way to teach students about emotions. SEL helps students to better understand their emotions and the emotions of others. By doing this is helps students develop empathy, make good decisions, and build on relationships with others. There are so many amazing books that have been written over the years that focus on many Social Emotional Learning topics.
There are five components of Social Emotional Learning:
- Self-awareness: Knowing and being aware of how your emotions can impact your behavior.
- Self - Management: Controlling your emotions, thoughts and actions in situations.
- Social Awareness: To be aware of others around you in your school, neighborhood and community. Recognizing differences in others backgrounds and cultures and being able to understand them and to act with empathy and respect towards others.
- Relationship Skills: Being able to build and keep relationships with people of various backgrounds. This includes listening to and speaking with others, solving conflicts peacefully and knowing when to ask others for help.
- Making responsible decisions: Knowing how to act and make decisions in situations taking ethics and others into account before making a decision.
Self Awareness: Overcoming Fear and Anxiety:
1. “The Good Egg” by Jory John and Pete Oswald: Good egg wants to be perfect all the time, even when everyone around him are making the wrong decisions. Good Egg starts to crack from all the pressure of feeling so much anxiety. How will he deal with these thoughts and feelings?
2. “The Girl Who Never Makes Mistakes” by Mark Pett and Gary Rubinstein: Everyone knew Beatrice never made mistakes and called her the girl who never made mistakes. But a few close calls made her fear she would make a mistake. What would happen then?
3. “Everyone Can Learn to Ride a Bicycle” by Chris Raschka: Learning to ride a bicycle can be a tough process full of mistakes and challenges. This book shows how important it is to never give up and to keep trying to reach your goal.
4. “The Whatifs” by Emily Kilgore: The whatifs attach themselves to Cora and she can’t shake them. How can she get rid of her worries like everyone else? Sometimes talking to a friend and sharing can help us understand that we are not alone and can change our viewpoint.
5. “ The Camping Trip” by Jennifer K. Mann: Camping is fun and full of some new experiences. However, they can be very different than experience you have had already. See how Erestine’s first camping trip goes with her Aunt and cousin. How will she cope with the new experiences at camp?
6. “A Case if the Zaps” by Alex Boniello: This book shows us that it is okay to have worries, even robots worried and they get the “zaps”! When we have worries or concerns it is important to talk about it. Sometimes we need help from our parents or even a doctor to make us feel better. We can discuss strategies to help us deal with our worries and get through tough situations.
7. “Brave Everyday” by Trudy Ludwig: Camila is overwhelmed by her “what if”, “I can’t” and “I’m scared” worries. But when she finds another friend who is also scared it helps her to be brave and try. Being anxious and worried is a normal part of our life and one way to help is to bravely try in big and little ways.
8. “Everybody Feels Scared” by Moira Butterfield: Everybody can feel scared. How can we do things that scare us? Sometimes a friend or a special object can help us overcome our fears and feel okay to try new things.
9.”Wemberly Worried” by Kevin Henkes: Wemberly worried about everything, big things, little things and everything in between. Her family encourages her not to worry, but she still does. When school starts she has an all new set of worries. Thanks goodness she meets a new friend who worries just as much as she does. Together they realize worrying stops them from enjoy all the fun of school!
10. “Jabari Jumps” by Gaia Cornwall: Jabari is excited to jump off the diving board after passing his swimming test. He is not afraid to jump into the water, but maybe he is a little afraid. Jabari’s dad talks to him about how he can get over being scared. Will Jabari jump?
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