By Giselle Shardlow
“I hate math!” my student yelled as she stood on her chair, stomping her feet and screaming. What had started as a normal classroom moment had quickly escalated into an emotional meltdown.
After some time, the words tumbled out—she told me how testing at school triggered intense anxiety. Students had to sit in silence with partitions at each desk and weren’t allowed to ask questions. The memory of those testing conditions was powerful enough to spark this reaction months later.
“You have one secret tool in your toolkit,” I told her gently.
“What?” she asked, her voice still quivering.
“Your breath.”
Giselle Shardlow, MEd, is the founder of Kids Yoga Stories (home of the popular Breathing Exercise Cards for Kids), which has been supporting educators, therapists, school counselors, yoga teachers, and parents for over thirteen years. She is on a mission to help empower children with the tools and skills to self-regulate, manage emotions, and be the healthiest versions of themselves.
