Theo's Mood: A Book of Feelings

My 4 year old daughter just happened to pick this book off the shelf of our local library and I'm so glad she did! She has a 1 year old sibling. This book does something that all the other "new sibling/big sister" books don't. It talks about the RANGE of feelings that a child might feel in reaction to having a new sibling (e.g., she can be jealous and happy). My daughter likes the book. She already knew how to put words to feelings but I feel like this book is helping her understand that you can have conflicting feelings which I'm convinced she has about her new sister.

Cute book. My 7 year old grandson likes it.

Terrible name

I am a preschool teacher. I bought this to read as part of a unit about feelings, for 3-6 year olds.I like that it shows children doing emotion sharing at school, and that it offers some specific situations that are likely to invoke certain feelings, and that it includes “intermediate” feelings (like jealousy) and more than one and ambivalent (conflicting) feelings. All of this is encouraged in current social emotional education practice.But, I really didn’t like that it referred to “good moods” and “bad moods.” A major part of social emotional education (and counseling) is that all feelings are okay. There aren’t “good” ones and “bad” ones. There are (however) good and bad actions/choices/behaviors, but there is a difference between how you feel and how you act/behave. The reason for this distinction is sometimes children (and adults) feel like they are “bad” when they are having “bad” feelings (anger, jealousy, etc) and sometimes they decide those feelings are unacceptable, so they refuse to acknowledge them (and repress them). This lack of acknowledgement causes the feelings to emerge inappropriately. By contrast, acknowledging them (and especially verbally labeling them), makes them manageable and brings the frontal lobe of the brain on board, integrating the experience. As a result, it is preferable to talk about “comfortable” and “uncomfortable” feelings and learn ways to be with/sit with the uncomfortable ones. You can, of course, just make these adjustments when you read it.Bottom line: There are better books on this topic available.

it was okay

I love how the whole class helps Theo understand how he feels. Team effort, cute book!

Excellent book for my kids at school

A great way for children to understand their moods and deal with the impact of having a sibling added to the family.