Anger is a normal and natural emotion in childhood. From temper tantrums to outbursts of frustration, it’s not uncommon for children to experience difficulty regulating their emotions. However, when anger becomes persistent, intense, or disruptive to relationships and daily functioning, it may be time to introduce targeted strategies to help children manage their feelings more effectively.
One powerful approach used by child therapists that has shown promise in emotional regulation, especially in adolescents and adults, is Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), used in therapy for children. The core skills of DBT therapy —Mindfulness, Distress Tolerance, Emotion Regulation, and Interpersonal Effectiveness—can be incredibly helpful for children learning to navigate big emotions like anger.
Understanding Anger in Children
It’s important to understand what anger looks like in children and why it happens.
Anger can be triggered by a wide range of situations:
- Feeling misunderstood or unfairly treated
- Struggles with impulse control or frustration tolerance
- Changes in routine or environment
- Experiences of trauma, anxiety, or sensory overload
Children may express anger through:
- Yelling or screaming
- Hitting, kicking, or throwing objects
- Refusing to follow directions
- Withdrawing or shutting down
These behaviors often mask deeper emotions such as sadness, embarrassment, fear, or disappointment. Helping a child understand and cope with anger requires compassion, consistency, and tools that empower them to respond rather than react.
What is DBT?
Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT) is a structured, evidence-based therapy that teaches individuals how to manage strong emotions, reduce conflict in relationships, and make mindful, values-based decisions. DBT is based on the concept of “dialectics,” which means holding two seemingly opposite truths at the same time—for example: “I’m doing the best I can and I need to try harder.”
The four main skill areas of DBT are:
- Mindfulness – Being present and aware of your thoughts, feelings, and surroundings.
- Distress Tolerance – Handling difficult emotions and situations without making things worse.
- Emotion Regulation – Understanding and changing intense emotions.
- Interpersonal Effectiveness – Communicating needs while maintaining relationships.
DBT Skills For Children
Let’s explore how each of these skills can be applied to help children manage anger.
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Mindfulness: Noticing the Storm Before It Hits
Why it helps: Mindfulness teaches children to pause, notice, and name their emotions without judgment. This can be a helpful first step in managing anger.
Child-friendly mindfulness techniques:
- “Name it to tame it”: Help your child put a name to their emotion: “I feel mad,” “I’m frustrated,” “I’m boiling inside,” or “I’m noticing.”
- Mindful breathing: Techniques such as belly breathing, paced breathing, or blowing bubbles slowly can help calm down.
- Body scans: Ask your child to notice where in their body they feel anger (e.g., clenched fists, hot face).
- Emotion thermometers: Use visuals to help children identify how intense their anger feels on a scale of 1–10.
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Distress Tolerance: Riding the Waves of Emotion
Why it helps: Sometimes, anger hits quickly and intensely. Distress Tolerance skills give children tools to survive the moment without acting on harmful impulses.
Child-friendly distress tolerance strategies:
- “STOP” Skill (Stop, Take a step back, Observe, Proceed mindfully): Teach children to freeze like a statue or envision a stop sign when they’re angry, then take a breath and think before reacting.
- “TIPP” Skill (Temperature, Intense exercise, Paced breathing, Paired muscle relaxation): This can be turned into fun activities like running in place or holding ice cubes to cool down emotionally.
- ACCEPTS / Distraction Activities: Use fidget toys, drawing materials, sensory items, calming music, or activities to distract your attention and worry thoughts.
- Grounding games/Self-Soothe kit: Try 5-4-3-2-1 sensory games to shift focus away from anger. You can also build and create a self-soothe kit that contains items using your senses that can help ground you. Items can include: your favorite blanket or candle, a fidget toy, your soft and comfy pajamas or clothing.
Practice tip: Role-play scenarios where your child pretends to get angry and practices using a distress tolerance skill to get through it.
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Emotion Regulation: Understanding and Shifting Feelings
Why it helps: Children often don’t know why they feel so angry, or what to do about it when they do. Emotion Regulation helps kids understand their emotions and make healthier choices.
Child-friendly emotion regulation strategies:
- Feelings check-ins: Use emoji charts or emotion feelings wheels to help your child express how they’re feeling throughout the day.
- Understanding the anger iceberg: Teach kids that anger is often a surface emotion hiding deeper feelings like fear or sadness.
- Daily mood tracking: Have your child track their feelings with colors or stickers in a journal.
- Building positive experiences: Encourage your child to engage in fun, relaxing activities every day to build emotional resilience.
Practice tip: Use “emotional stories” to talk through characters’ feelings and choices in books or movies. Ask, “What else could they have done instead of yelling?”
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Interpersonal Effectiveness: Communicating Without Exploding
Why it helps: Many anger issues stem from poor communication or unmet needs. Interpersonal Effectiveness teaches children how to ask for what they need without aggression.
Child-friendly communication tools:
- DEAR MAN Skill (Describe, Express, Assert, Reinforce, Mindful, Appear confident, Negotiate): Simplify for kids by teaching them to “Use your words” and express what they want clearly and calmly.
- “I feel” statements: Teach children to say things like, “I feel mad when you take my toy. What can I do to earn it back?”
- Active listening games: Practice taking turns speaking and listening with a timer or a talking stick.
- Praise and reinforcement: Acknowledge when your child expresses anger appropriately with encouragement and specific praise.
Practice tip: Use puppets or stuffed animals to role-play conflicts and practice expressing needs without yelling or hitting.
DBT in Real Life: What it could look like…
Let’s imagine a scenario where a child named Max struggles with anger outbursts, especially when he feels things are unfair.
Morning:
Max doesn’t want to go to school. His mom uses mindfulness to help him identify when he feels anxious and frustrated. They do deep breathing together while naming their feelings.
At school:
Another student cuts in line. Max starts to yell, but remembers his STOP skill and takes a step back. His teacher gives him an ice pack from his self-soothe kit to cool off and regain composure.
After school:
Max journals his emotions with color codes and draws a picture of how he felt at recess. He uses this time for emotion regulation to understand what triggered his anger.
Evening:
At dinner, Max calmly tells his sister, “I felt mad when you grabbed my toy. Next time, please ask.” His parents celebrate his progress in interpersonal effectiveness with praise.
Tips for Parents, Teachers, and Caregivers
Helping a child manage anger or intense emotions using DBT skills is a team effort. Here’s how adults can support them:
- Model the skills: Practice mindfulness, emotion regulation, and calm communication yourself.
- Be consistent: Use the same language and strategies across home and school.
- Praise effort: Celebrate small wins and improvements in emotional control.
- Use visuals and stories: Children learn best with pictures, games, and narrative.
- Build routines: Structure and predictability help reduce emotional dysregulation.
Planting Seeds of Emotional Wisdom
Anger doesn’t have to be scary or overwhelming—for children or for the adults who care for them. With the right tools and a nurturing environment, children can learn to manage their anger, understand their emotions, and communicate their needs in healthy ways.
DBT skills learned at DBT of South Jersey offer evidence-based strategies that can be adapted to support children’s emotional development. By teaching mindfulness, emotion regulation, distress tolerance, and communication skills, we empower children not just to “control” their anger, but to grow from it, understand it, and transform it.
And in doing so, we help them build the foundation for a life filled with stronger relationships, emotional resilience, and self-understanding.
Help Your Child Build Emotional Strength and Resilience with Therapy for Children in South Jersey
If your child is having a hard time managing anger, therapy for children in South Jersey can offer the support and tools they need. At DBT of South Jersey, we specialize in helping kids build DBT skills to cope with intense emotions and make positive changes. Contact us today to take the first step toward a calmer, more confident future for your child. Follow these three simple steps to get started:
- Contact us to book a free consultation with our intake team
- Meet with one of our skilled child therapists
- Start seeing your child cope with intense emotions and make positive changes!
Additional Services Offered at DBT of South Jersey
At DBT of South Jersey, in addition to offering therapy for children where kids can build emotional strength and learn to navigate anger in healthy ways, we understand that each family has its own dynamics, which is why we take a holistic approach that includes support for parents and caregivers as well. With locations in Moorestown and Voorhees, our services include trauma-informed therapy, OCD treatment, couples and family therapy, and integrative healing methods. Visit our blog to discover helpful tips, resources, and insights on therapy for children and adolescents.
