How Do I Feel? A Dictionary of Emotions for Children

Finalist in the New Zealand Children & Young Adults Books Awards 2022

Storylines Notable Books 2021 - Non-Fiction Winner - #1 NZ Bestseller

Available on Kindle Fire for colour E-Readers

With 60+ definitions to help improve emotional literacy. This HUGE hardcover book with over 140 pages, is all about our children learning to recognise and label emotions and feelings.

Join Aroha and her friends as they share how different emotions might feel in the body and how each emotion might be helpful. This emotions dictionary is all about helping children find the words for how they truly feel. Learning to recognise and label our emotions correctly is such an important skill for life. 

Giving our children this language helps to build emotional literacy. It is a gift to give children the tools to know how to recognise what they truly feel and that is it okay to feel all emotions. When they know that no emotion is ‘good’ or ‘bad’ and that all emotions provide messages, then it takes away any attachment to that emotion being part of who they are.

We may have experienced this ourselves being labelled ‘naughty’ or ‘out of control’ due to feeling angry a lot. However, this behaviour is just a way for a child to communicate. Diving deeper into why they are acting that way, why they may be feeling the things they are, can help us find some answers with our child. It can also help us find ways to help them empower themselves with tools to feel better.

Use this book to start conversations about different emotions. If you can, give examples of things you have experienced. When you see a child experiencing an emotion, help your child label it. “Are you feeling ... right now?”

This book can be used with children from 5 years of age up to 100+ as everyone might get something from the book. 

There are over 200 emotions and so we couldn't include them all in just one book, however, this book is the most extensive book about emotions for children.

Frequently Asked Questions

What ages is How Do I Feel? best for? Perfect for ages 5–99+! Honestly, this book is one for the whole family. It has been used with young children right up to adults in their seventies who have emailed me to say the book has helped them so much. Therapists and psychologists have also emailed to advise they are using the book with all age groups. It is clear and easy to understand. The real magic happens when kids (and adults) suddenly go from “I don’t know what I'm feeling” to “I feel ashamed” or “I feel overwhelmed”. 

Why is being able to identify our emotions so important?

Because when a child (or adult!) can say “I feel ashamed” instead of just exploding, hiding, or hurting themselves, everything changes.

Naming the feeling is the very first step to calming it. It turns a scary, overwhelming wave into something we can understand, share, and let flow through us.

Research backs this up again and again: Kids who can accurately name their emotions → have fewer tantrums → make friends easier → do better at school → grow into adults with lower anxiety, depression, and addiction rates (Harvard’s 75-year study + decades of emotional-intelligence research).

In other words: The bigger a child’s feeling-word vocabulary, the smaller their inner world feels, and the happier and braver they become.

That’s exactly why How Do I Feel? gives children 65 beautiful, honest words (even the tricky ones like shame, jealousy, and remorse). Because every word we give them is a little life-raft for the big waves.

How many emotions are in the book and why does that matter? 65 emotions – from the big obvious ones (happy, sad, angry) to the sneaky, harder ones kids actually feel every day: shame, disappointment, jealousy, overwhelmed, embarrassed, vulnerable… Most feelings books stop at 20–30. We went to 65 because the more words a child has for their inner world, the less they explode and the more they talk. Simple as that.

Will this actually help with tantrums and big meltdowns? Yes. Over and over parents tell me the same thing: within days their child starts pointing to a page and saying “This is me right now” instead of exploding, bottling things up or feeling confused and scared with their emotions. Every emotion in the book explains how the body looks/feels AND why the feeling is actually helpful (yes, even shame and anger have a job!). That single shift – from “bad feeling” to “helpful messenger” – is what calms the storm.

Are there tips for parents or is it just for kids? This book isn't just for kids. The older generations probably didn't learn about emotions like this. I didn't! So I have made all our books so that the adults can learn alongside our kids. Every book has parent/teacher notes at the back which expands on book with helpful questions to ask your child to really create those deeper conversations and connections. Plus we offer a lot of free resources along with our books.

How is this different from other feelings books or charts? Most books/charts label the feeling and stop there. We go deeper: → What does it REALLY feel like in the body? → Why is this feeling helpful? (Yes, even the “uncomfortable” ones) → Beautiful illustrations of children from all over the world with energy lines by Craig Phillips → Created-from-real-therapy depth (this is literally the book I needed as a suicidal teenager) It’s not just a book. It’s the cycle-breaker so many of us wish we’d had.