Children and Teen Books & Activity Books

Andrea’s children’s books and teen books and workbooks are all available on Blurb in print and Amazon in print and Kindle versions. You can find all her Amazon products on Andrea’s AUTHOR PAGE at the link just below.

Amazon.com/author/lauritzen_becomingexceptional

When My Feelings Come to Visit, Activity Book One: Naming My Feelings

When My Feelings Come to Visit, Activity Book One: Naming My Feelings is book one in a series about feelings. In order to understand, recognize and manage our feelings we first have to get to know them and be able to name them. This book engages learners in understanding what feelings, or emotions, are and how to recognize them in our bodies, and understand what the job of each emotion is. Each emotion brings its own sensation – how it makes our bodies feel. It takes practice to recognize what our emotions feel like in our bodies and what they are trying to tell us. Learning to listen, and respond in healthy ways, to our emotions is vital for healthy relationships and social interactions. This book provides fun ways for individuals or classes to learn and practice recognizing which feeling they are experiencing and what that’s like for them, and that we all experience our emotions differently.

Also included are several activities with detailed instructions, supply lists, and learning outcomes to increase a person’s ability to name, recognize, and understand all their feelings better. This book can be used for individuals, and families, in educational settings, and for therapeutic purposes. Together, this series is a great resource for individuals, parents, teachers, and therapists to increase a person’s emotional vocabulary, emotional regulation, and self-awareness in fun and interactive ways. Though written for young children, it can be used for any age with individuals who are still learning to self-regulate and understand their emotions so they can respond to them in healthy ways and meet their emotional and relationship needs.

Book two will address how to manage our emotions, and book three will teach about sharing our emotions. Coming Soon.

Amazon softcover and Kindle versions are available.

Mortimer the Masked

Mortimer the Masked is the story of a boy dealing with the challenges of a changing world. Though specific to COVID-19, this tale can be applied to life in general. Due to a couple of potentially scary situations (panic attack, nightmare) this book may not be appropriate for children under eight years old. However, assess the developmental preparedness of your individual child or classroom to determine their ability to understand the challenges Mortimer faces.

We get to see life from the point of view of a 10-year-old boy and how he sees the changes in his life as Mortimer deals with parental job loss, changes at school and with friends, kids not keeping the rules, and the consequences of his own choices. He also faces stress, mental health issues, nightmares, and more. Though most of us won’t be faced with all these challenges at once, we see how Mortimer and his family deal with these changes and all the many emotions involved when life presents new and different experiences. See how Mortimer and his family address issues and get through these hard times.

At the back of the story, there are several pages of questions that adults can choose from, as applicable to their specific challenges or the environmental setting (i.e. home, school, therapy) that may encourage conversations about hard things or feelings youth might be dealing with.

Mortimer the Masked is a great book to read in classrooms to help teach kids a better way to face life. Included in the story are a couple of techniques for calming down or dealing with stressful life situations.

We’re all in these challenging and changing times together. Many of us are dealing with job loss, changing and inconsistent school situations, and new social expectations that impact our circumstances, feelings, and future. Mortimer the Masked can teach us how to look at life’s challenging situations in positive ways, how working together helps us through any hard time, and how important it is to talk to someone we trust about how we’re feeling before our emotions get out of control.

As a Social Worker and having worked in school settings, Andrea understands how impactful life can be on the emotions and perspectives of children who may or may not have all the correct information about a situation, and who don’t developmentally have all that may be required to deal with the circumstances in which they find themselves. Having conversations with our children about their emotions, thoughts, and understandings can be insightful to adults who may believe that because children are resilient that they aren’t also negatively impacted, especially due to limited ability or resources to cope with challenges.

BLURB Soft Cover Book. Ships in 2-3 weeks.

https://www.blurb.com/b/10270595-mortimer-the-masked\