Balloon Anger Activity (A Play Therapy Strategy)

In this article, we will look at the balloon anger activity which is a play therapy technique for helping children understand anger through visual demonstration. This article gives a step by step guide on how to go about the balloon anger activity and how to tell if your child’s anger is not normal.

What is The Balloon Anger Activity?

Balloons of Anger is a play therapy technique which gives children a visual demonstration of anger and how it can affect them and others around them. In this play therapy technique, children are shown how anger keeps accumulating inside us, and if it is not released in a healthy manner, it can explode causing unnecessary pain to ourselves and to those around us.

Application

Helping children understand their emotions is extremely crucial and anger is one such emotion which is often difficult to navigate for children so in order to help them understand anger and its implications The Balloons of Anger activity is an ideal play therapy technique to help them understand anger. 

Balloons of Anger is a fun and efficient technique that gives kids a visual representation of anger and the effects it could have on them and their surroundings. It enables the kids to understand how anger can accumulate within them and how, if not released gently and safely, it can erupt and cause harm to themselves or others.

Indications To Use The Balloon Anger Activity

The balloons of anger activity is useful for aggressive children who have trouble managing their anger, as well as reserved children who internalise their anger rather than releasing it in a healthy manner. 

Practice this activity with your kids at home to educate them about emotions and feelings and how to manage them effectively.

Things You Will Need

A Few Balloons

A Pin

Step By Step Guide

Here is a step by step guide on how to go about the balloon anger activity:

• The child inflates a balloon, and the caregiver assists in tying it.
• The balloon symbolizes the body, and the air within the balloon symbolizes anger, according to the caregiver.
• “Can air come inside or outside of the balloon?” the caregiver inquires of the toddler. “What might happen if all this anger (air) remained trapped within you?” “Can there be sufficient space to make good decisions?”
• The caregiver then instructs the youngster to trample the balloon until it bursts, releasing all of the anger (air).
• The caregiver then emphasizes that if the balloon were a person, the balloon’s bursting would be considered a hostile act (e.g., hitting a person or object). The caregiver inquires if this appears to be a sensible approach for the child to express anger.
• The child then inflates a second balloon, except instead of tying it, he pinches the end shut. The caregiver instructs the child to gently release a little air before pinching it shut again.
• “Is the balloon smaller?” the caregiver inquires of the child.Ask the child, “Did the balloon pop?”. 
• “Did the balloon and those near it remain safe once the anger was released?” “Does this feel like a more comfortable and safe way to express your anger and frustration?”
• The caregiver adds that the balloon symbolizes anger once more at the end of the session. 
• The anger flows out gently and safely when we talk about what makes us angry and discover strategies to release it correctly. 
• The caregiver informs the child that allowing anger to pent up inside can cause it to erupt, causing damage to the child or others.

Questions To Ask Your Child

Before getting started with the balloons of anger activity consider asking your child these questions to make it and interactive and reflective activity:

• How does it feel to be angry?
• What kinds of things anger you?
• Whenever you get angry, how do you react?
• So, how do you deal with your anger?

Play Therapy And Its Importance

In therapeutic practise, play therapy is a well-established and successful approach for child therapy. Because children haven’t quite mastered the abstract reasoning abilities and linguistic skills required to appropriately communicate their emotions, ideas, and behaviours, play therapy has been found to be a beneficial strategic approach. Toys become a child’s words, and play becomes their dialogue in play therapy.

Play therapy is an interpersonal process in which a skilled therapist uses the therapeutic qualities of play, such as relationship building, communication, catharsis, and attachment formation, to assist clients in resolving current psychological disorders and preventing potential ones.

However, there are a number of approaches that parents/caretakers can use at home to help with specific psychological issues and the balloons of anger activity is one of them.

How To Tell If Your Child’s Anger Is Not Normal  

Now how to identify whether your child’s emotional outbursts or anger are out of the ordinary?

Here are a few signs that your child’s anger is not normal, and should be a cause of concern, and that you should seek professional help for your child’s anger issues:

• If your child’s outbursts and tantrums continue beyond the developmental age of 7 or 8 years old, it’s time to seek help.
• If his actions endanger him or others.
• If their behaviour is giving her problems at school, with teachers complaining that they are out of control, you should seek help.
• If their behaviour makes it difficult for him to get along with other children, they may be removed from play dates and birthday celebrations.
• If their rebellion and outbursts are generating a lot of strife at home and hurting family relationships.
• If they’re frustrated because they can’t manage their anger and it’s making them feel horrible about themselves.

If you see these signs in your child, you should seek help without further delay because getting your child to therapy may resolve their anger in a way that might not be possible at home and in the long run you will be grateful that you did it for them.

BetterHelp: A Better Alternative

Those who are seeking therapy online may also be interested in BetterHelp. BetterHelp offers plenty of formats of therapy, ranging from live chats, live audio sessions and live video sessions. In addition, unlimited messaging through texting, audio messages and even video messages are available here.

BetterHelp also offers couples therapy and therapy for teenagers in its platform. Furthermore, group sessions can also be found in this platform, covering more than twenty different topics related to mental health and mental illness. The pricing of BetterHelp is also pretty cost-effective, especially considering the fact that the platform offers financial aid to most users.

Conclusion

In this article, we looked at the balloon anger activity which is a play therapy technique for helping children understand anger through visual demonstration. This article gives a step by step guide on how to go about the balloon anger activity and how to tell if your child’s anger is not normal.

Frequently Asked Questions: Balloon Anger Activity

References

Play Therapy Technique: Balloons of Anger

Is My Child’s Anger Normal?