Creative Relaxation Ideas for Children

Learning to relax is a genuine skill, and like any skill, it develops through practice, playfulness, and repetition, not through being told to calm down in the moment itself. These ideas work particularly well for younger children, and connect closely to the emotional regulation work I write about elsewhere, if you’d like to understand the fuller picture of why this matters, my blog Is Your Child Emotionally Dysregulated? is a good place to start.

Start with the breath, playfully

Many parents tell me their child resists when simply asked to “breathe slowly.” A playful approach tends to work far better than a direct instruction. Try pretending to blow out candles, imagining worries as clouds floating away, blowing bubbles together, or breathing like ocean waves, in and out. A party popper works well too, so does pretending to smell a favourite flower, or heading outside to blow dandelion puffs and watch worries drift off. These small, playful entry points into slow breathing connect directly to vagal tone, the body’s own calming mechanism, which I explore further in 7 Five-Minute Vagal Tone Calm Down Exercises

Relaxation ideas for children — **Breathe, make a wish and blow those worries away**

Try visualisation together

Children have wonderful imaginations, and visualisation makes good use of that. A simple “find your safe place” exercise works well from around age five upwards. Ask your child to settle, breathe slowly, and picture a safe place, anywhere that comes to mind first, without leading them there yourself. Let them notice the colours, sounds, and smells, and stay there a moment. Count down gently before bringing them back. This needs practising together a few times before your child can use it independently, and that is completely normal.

For younger children, particularly preschoolers, try lying down together with a favourite soft toy placed on your child’s belly, and ask them to watch it rise and fall as they breathe. This teaches deep breathing without needing any words at all.

Children have fantastic imaginations and are always ready to utilise them. Here are a few simple ideas, scripts and a free audio

Big Floating balloon

This is concise relaxation audio for all age groups up to 12. It is simple and easy. Please let me know if it helps you!

Find your safe place.

When we want to relax, we need to feel safe. This simple visualisation can be used with all age groups from 5 onwards. It’s excellent for those older children. However, you need to practise this together for them to master it. Some children may internalise the feeling more quickly, depending on their self-control level, so adjust your expectations. You can listen below if you don’t want to use the script.

So, lie down or sit in a chair and start breathing (you can follow my audio above for that bit). Now, I want you to imagine a safe place. It can be anywhere (try not to lead your child) gently ask them to go with the first place that arises in your mind. Feel the colours, the sounds and smells, and feel safe in that place. Keep breathing…..now I want you to take something that will help you feel even safer….breathe (just let them stay there a while)

Now we are going to leave that place on the count of 3, I then want you to open your eyes. 321…..open your eyes when you are ready! Then talk about their journey.

Relaxation through movement

Some children relax best through movement rather than stillness. Becoming a tree, swaying gently, or a turtle, pulling into its shell, gives a physical, playful route into calm for children who find sitting still genuinely hard.

A self-soothe box for relaxation

For children aged around seven and up, a self-soothe box is a wonderful relaxation tool, and a lovely thing to build together before the holidays begin. I cover exactly how to create one, including ideas across all five senses, in Create a Self-Soothe Box to Enable Calm Down

The five senses exercise

When your child is stressed, this simple grounding technique helps them come back into their body and the present moment. Ask them to notice one thing they can see, one thing they can hear, something they can taste, keeping a low-sugar sweet to hand is a nice touch, something they can smell, and something they can feel.

Interested in working with me?

If you would like more tailored support for your child or family, I offer one to one therapy for children and young people, therapeutic parenting support for parents, and training and consultation for professionals working with children and families. Please do get in touch if you would like to find out more.

You can reach me via my contact page.

Free resources

Understanding Your Child’s Guard Dog Brain explains what is happening in your child’s nervous system when big feelings take over.

Holding in the Storm is about staying steady as a parent in the hard moments.

When Darkness Comes includes specific support for sleep difficulties and anxiety at night.

All free to download.