❤️🩹 What is Calm?
Why “calm” isn’t always regulated... It's sometimes silent crisis...
👋 Welcome to SEMH Education!
Every week, I share insights, strategies, and tips from my experience working with children and professionals on social, emotional, and mental health (SEMH) in education. This week, we’re exploring what calm really looks like for children.
We often expect children to “calm down” when they’re dysregulated, but is that always the right goal? This week, we explore what safe expression really looks like and why regulation doesn’t have to mean silence or stillness.
We often talk about helping children “regulate,” but too often, what we really mean is helping them be quiet and sit still.
This isn’t regulation; it’s compliance.
For all children with Social, Emotional, and Mental Health (SEMH) needs, those who are neurodivergent, have experienced trauma, or are living in a state of chronic dysregulation, calm isn’t always accessible. And in some cases, it shouldn’t be the expectation in the first place.
☯️ Regulation ≠ Stillness
Imagine telling a child in the middle of a panic attack to “calm down.” Now imagine how often we do exactly that, albeit with different words, when a child is pacing, vocalising loudly, or visibly distressed in class.
We need to reframe what we consider “regulated” behaviour.
Sometimes, regulation might look like:
Clapping loudly while breathing deeply
Pacing back and forth with a trusted adult
Using a resistance band under a desk
Singing a familiar song quietly
Narrating their emotions out loud: “I’m really mad right now, but I’m not going to hit!”
Each of these might signal emotional containment, not chaos. They could be the very first steps toward true regulation, without suppression or shame.
🧑🏫Own Experience: This is inevitably hard in mainstream settings. A child walking around the room, clapping, singing or narrating their emotions is definitely disruptive, I’m not disputing that at all.
What I am saying is that, in some cases, this is all the regulation a child needs, and 30 seconds of clapping might just do the trick! Even better if the child has a pupil passport and all the other children and staff are aware that this is one of their regulation techniques! This short disruption is much more beneficial than a forced calm, which might result in a child entering crisis.
The key here is to reframe your view of regulation techniques. I know for myself, I have many regulation techniques that don’t look calming. Going for a run, a long walk, and listening to loud music are all disruptive strategies I use to regulate.
I once had a child who would give the teaching assistant a small rubber duck. This meant they needed to leave the classroom and regulate.
It worked incredibly well!
Leaving for a short period to regulate and then returning to class reduced the behaviour logs by around 50% for this child.
✉️ Relevant post
❤️🩹 Safe Expression Over Suppression
When we teach children that regulation = silence, we risk:
Reinforcing shame around big feelings
Encouraging masking (especially for autistic pupils)
Missing golden opportunities to help children learn to name, explore, and safely manage their emotions
Masking refers to when a child deliberately hides or suppresses their true emotional state to appear more socially acceptable, avoid negative attention, or fit into their environment.
Masking can be the reason for delayed identification of needs, and also emotional exhaustion.
Instead, we need to create classrooms where emotional expression isn’t feared, but scaffolded.
This can be in a variety of ways. What that essentially means is:
Validating emotions even when they’re loud or messy.
“It makes sense that you feel overwhelmed when the room gets too noisy.”Naming the feeling, not just the behaviour.
“I understand that you’re feeling frustrated right now” instead of “Stop shouting.”Offering safe, controlled options for movement and voice:
movement breaks, body-based calming tools, and vocal outlets like humming or repetition.
🧑🏫Own Experience: I’ve talked about how to create inclusive classrooms before here.
The key to creating an inclusive, safe and scaffolded culture is with language and opportunity.
If you change your language to a more structured and understanding approach, the children will begin to use this language too.
This provides them with more opportunities to express their emotions in a measured way and ultimately creates a culture in which feelings aren’t feared but celebrated!
🧰 Big Feelings Need Big Tools
Think about how you regulate. Is it always by sitting still and breathing quietly? Or is it sometimes by going for a walk, blasting music, ranting to a friend, or dancing around your kitchen? Let me know what other ways you regulate in the comments.
Children deserve the same breadth of tools, especially those with SEMH needs. A regulated classroom doesn’t have to be a silent one!
Practical ways to support this:
“Big Energy” stations: spaces for safe movement or resistance play.
Emotion roleplay: model expression and repair, not just self-control.
Sound-safe zones: allow pupils to make noise without punishment, redirect, don’t suppress.
Co-regulation: from staff who are calm enough, not perfectly calm.
🧑🏫Own Experience: I’ve found the zones especially impactful in lower key stages. Admittedly, the sound-safe zone is better if it’s an outdoor area adjacent to the classroom!
Social stories are amazing for teaching children more appropriate and safe ways to manage their emotions. Going through an example from a third-person perspective really helps the child to understand why their current strategy is unsafe or disruptive.
I’ve also talked before about co-regulation and mirroring body language. It gives a sense of connection, which helps to promote calm. It’s easy to implement and anyone can do it! It’s one of the most effective co-regulation techniques out there. Other co-regulation techniques might include: timed activities, sensory activities, drawing, colouring, tapping to a beat, completing a puzzle, etc.
💬 Reflection prompt
When a child is dysregulated, are we helping them feel safe? Or just helping them look calm?
👇 Try this in your classroom this week:
Create an Emotion Outlet Menu
Ask pupils: “What helps when you feel frustrated, fidgety, angry, or anxious?”
Encourage them to suggest both quiet and expressive strategies (e.g., movement, sound, pressure, voice).
Create a visual display in your calm corner or share with the child’s home to encourage consistency.
Once you’ve outlined the preferred regulation techniques for the children in your class, you can create stations, mood boards, purchase equipment and generally make your classroom more inclusive.
This WILL save you time in the long run, I promise. Once you’ve invested time in understanding the children’s different needs in terms of regulation, they will decrease their frequency of disruptive behaviour. This should result in the class being disrupted less, which will inevitably have a positive impact for the entire class’ learning outcomes!
Did You Miss These?
Alternative consequences for behaviour!
A method of unpacking tricky situations within education
What the 6 stages of crisis actually mean!
What a vital reflection. Unless you really, really know a child - and sometimes not even then - it’s impossible to know whether a child really is calm or not.
There’s so much to take from this post. Thank Kieran!