North Carolina Early Learning and Development Progressions: Birth to Five

Domain: NC Foundations for Early Learning: Emotional and Social Development (ESD)

Subdomain: Learning About Feelings

Goal: Children identify, manage, and express their feelings.

Skill Progression: Emotional expression

Age: 24-27 Months

Click here to go to all skills for ages 24-27 Months.

Extensive emotional vocabulary, but still may hit or bite to express anger or frustration

Situations for Observation of Skill

Observe the child in natural routines of the day, especially with siblings or peers when frustration or anger may be aroused.

Elicitation Strategy

No elicitation needed.

Behavior Observed

Toddlers experience an abundance of extreme emotions. Even though they may have words, their emotions may be stronger than their ability to control them.

Routines-based Intervention (Embedded Instruction)

Encourage early childhood educators and parents to talk to the child about emotions. The ability to communicate about what she is feeling helps adults understand how the child is experiencing different events. Use of emotion language can also help the child develop control over her behavior. If she can talk about how she feels, she has less need to act out her feelings.

 North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, 2015

©2015 by the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/.