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Free templateChild Development & Programming

Emotion Regulation Thermometer

A one-page ‘feelings thermometer’ poster with four colour zones — Rest Zone, Ready to Learn, Spiking and Stop — each with four feeling or behaviour words and a road-sign symbol, so children can point to where they are.

Format
Printable PDF · A4
Pages
1
Best for
Educators · ages 4–8
Updated
Sept 2026
Download free templateSee what’s inside

No sign-up required. Print it and share it with your team — it’s free for any child care program to use.

Preview of the Emotion Regulation Thermometer

What’s inside

Four zones, from Rest Zone to Stop, with the words for each

  • Rest Zone (blue)Tired, sad, sick, bored — marked with a ‘Rest Area’ sign.
  • Ready to Learn (green)Calm, happy, OK, ready — marked with a ‘Go’ sign and an ‘Aim for here’ sun.
  • Spiking (orange)Silly, restless, hyper, confused — marked with a ‘Caution’ sign.
  • Stop (red)Mad, hitting, frustrated, yelling — marked with a ‘Stop’ sign, at the bulb of the thermometer.

How to use it

Four steps to put it to work this week

  1. 1
    Teach the zones when everyone is calmCircle time or a small group — never mid-meltdown.
  2. 2
    Talk about body cluesThe poster lists feeling words, not body signs. Ask children where they feel mad or restless in their body and note their answers beside the poster.
  3. 3
    Refer to it early‘Where are you on the thermometer?’ at Spiking is a conversation. At Stop it is too late.
  4. 4
    Celebrate the cool-downWhen a child gets back to green, name it: ‘You noticed you were spiking and took space. That worked.’

Tips from operators

What centers that use this well do differently

Learned the hard way across 3,000 child care spaces — and from the directors and educators who join our Lunch & Learns and Learning Labs.

Use it one-to-one for children who need more support

Go through the poster with the child and write down their own words for each zone and what helps. Those notes become a personal regulation plan you can share with families and specialists.

Keep the strategies physical

Young children regulate through the body — water, movement, weight and breath work better than talking.

Share it with the child’s next room

When a child moves up, send a copy of the poster and any notes with them so the new educator starts with the same language.

Do it digitally in ChildFriendly Pro

Plan the week in the app — tagged to your framework automatically

Build the same plan in ChildFriendly Pro and every observation you log is tagged to FLIGHT, ELECT, ELF or your own outcomes, added to each child’s portfolio and shared with families in their daily journal.

  • Pre-loaded provincial frameworks and outcome tags
  • AI learning stories from a photo and two lines of notes
  • Portfolios and progress reports that build themselves
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FAQ

Questions about the Emotion Regulation Thermometer

Can’t find your answer? Chat with a real person who has run a child care center.

Read more FAQs
How is the thermometer different from the Emotion Zones Chart?

Both sort feelings into four colour zones. The Zones Chart shows sixteen drawn faces with a feeling word each; the thermometer stacks the zones from Rest Zone down to Stop, adds road-sign cues (Go, Caution, Stop) and marks green as the zone to aim for. Many rooms use the chart for daily check-ins and the thermometer with children working on big feelings.

Can it be used for anxiety as well as anger?

The words on the poster lean towards tiredness, energy and anger; ‘worried’ and ‘scared’ are not printed on it. You can still use the zones for worry — talk with the child about which zone it belongs in for them and write it in.

Is there evidence behind this approach?

Scaling tools like this are a common component of cognitive-behavioural and social-emotional learning programs used with young children. This template is a free classroom aid; it is not a clinical tool.

Should I include it in a behaviour support plan?

It is a good fit. Attach a copy of the poster to the plan so every adult uses the same zone names.

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