About This Lesson
Understanding emotions is an important part of student wellbeing, self-awareness, and social development. This Emotions Foundations Pack provides autism-friendly tools that help students identify, sort, and communicate feelings in a supportive and accessible way. By exploring emotions through visuals, categorization activities, and discussion prompts, students build the foundational skills needed for emotional regulation, self-advocacy, and positive relationships.
Here's what you'll get
• My Emotional Brain Worksheet
• Deep Dive Into Positive Emotions Worksheet
• Positive and Negative Emotions Sorting Cards
• Teacher implementation suggestions
• Autism-friendly visual supports
• Access to additional wellbeing resources and lesson plans
Why you'll love this activity bundle
• Simple, visual, and easy to implement
• Supports emotional awareness and communication
• Designed with autism-friendly learning principles in mind
• Works as a standalone activity or as part of a larger SEL curriculum
• Encourages self-reflection and emotional vocabulary development
Ways to use
• Morning meetings and SEL lessons
• Counseling and social skills groups
• Calm-down corner activities
• Individual instruction and IEP goals
• Family discussions about emotions at home
What is Jolts of Joy?
Don’t wait for joy to come to you, go get more of it! Science shows that joy-inducing activities transform the way we think, perform and respond. Jolts of Joy are small, intentional actions that inject positive emotions into our day and help us take control of our wellbeing moment to moment. The overall goal is to have greater control over the ratio of positive to negative emotions you experience each day. By unleashing the power of positive emotions with intention, you and your students can jolt yourself into joy!
Science of Positive Emotions
Positive emotions create opportunities for growth and healing, mentally and physically. The Broaden and Build theory is based on the notion that positive emotions enable us to develop new and creative ways of thinking to enhance wellbeing and promote resilience. Scientific evidence finds that even little moments of joy throughout the day add up to greater physical and mental wellbeing. People who experience positive emotions think better, perform better, and feel better. Experiencing positive emotions regularly can:
- Open our eyes and minds
- Increase creative thinking
- Expand our visual field
- Allow for global thinking and diversity
- Prevent depression and anxiety
- Undoing effect
- Improve cardiac functioning
- Increase healthy sleep
Looking for more Jolts of Joy resources?
Explore the free Jolts of Joy Unit Study, which comes with teaching slides, additional worksheets and activities, and even IEP and BIP recommendations tailored specifically to students with autism.
Proof Positive’s resources are and will always be free. Be well!
★ Bonus access to full lesson plans and unit studies on the skills of happiness at our Skill Center
