Our Calm Corner

The Book

The Shouting Girl

Written by Steven Huynh, illustrated by Gehenna Pham, published by Steven De GC

The poem follows a young girl who struggles to express herself calmly, often shouting when she feels frustrated or unheard. Through her journey, she learns to recognise and understand her emotions (AC9HPFP03, AC9HP2P03 – Foundation to Year 2, Health and Physical Education) and works to develop positive strategies for expressing her thoughts and feelings in respectful ways (AC9HPFP02, AC9HP2P02 – Foundation to Year 2, Health and Physical Education).

The story also encourages children to explore characters’ perspectives and emotional responses, fostering empathy (AC9HP2P01 – Health and Physical Education, Years 1 and 2). It helps them define safe and unsafe environments through interactions with friends in a classroom, establishing help-seeking strategies in such situations (AC9HP2P05 – Health and Physical Education, Years 1 and 2). Additionally, the book highlights how environments, such as a calm corner or designated green boxes, can be designed to support emotional regulation and meet classroom needs (AC9TDEFK01, AC9TDE2K01 – Foundation to Year 2, Design and Technologies).

With its poetic language and engaging illustrations, The Shouting Girl helps students understand how rhyme and rhythm create cohesion in poems. It also explores how words and images shape settings and characters, along with other literary features such as lists of three and similes.

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Resource creator

Kristina Wood

Subject

Designing (Design and Technologies), Emotional regulation (Health and Physical Education),

Level

Foundation, Year 1, Year 2,

Description

After reading The Shouting Girl, children explore what helps them reset when they feel big emotions. They are invited to co-design a calm corner by choosing and pasting calming tools into a visual space (e.g., a tent, a sofa, or a box). This empowers children to identify strategies that support self-regulation and builds respect for diverse needs.

Learning Intentions

• We are learning to identify tools and strategies that help us feel calm when we have big emotions.

Successful Criteria

• I can talk about what helps me feel calm.
• I can choose calming tools that work for me.
• I can design a calm corner using pictures and explain my choices.

Curriculum Alignment

AC9HP2P05 9.0 (Health and Physical Education Year 1,Year 2): Identify and demonstrate protective behaviours and help-seeking strategies they can use to help them and others stay safe

• identifying the body’s reaction to a range of situations, including safe and unsafe situations, and comparing the different emotional responses
• identifying and rehearsing strategies they can use when requiring assistance, such as asking an adult they trust, reading signs and symbols to identify safe places, and solving a problem with friends
• proposing strategies they can use at school and home that promote healthy use of digital tools
• recognising photos and locations of safe places and a network of people who can help
• discussing the importance of seeking help when problems are too big to solve by themselves
• exploring how characters in texts use protective behaviours and help-seeking strategies to keep themselves and others safe

AC9HPFP05 9.0 (Health and Physical Education Foundation): Demonstrate protective behaviours, name body parts and rehearse help-seeking strategies that help keep them safe

• exploring protective behaviours and help-seeking strategies they can use when they or others feel unsafe or uncomfortable
• exploring and demonstrating assertive strategies to seek help when they or others feel unsafe
• recognising online spaces and digital tools that are safe for them to use and recognising the importance of seeking help from a trusted adult if they feel unsafe while online
• identifying a support network of adults they can trust to help them if they feel unsafe, uncomfortable or scared
• recognising that all people have the right to bodily autonomy: the right to make choices about what others ask them to do with and to their bodies

AC9TDE2P01 9.0 (Design and Technologies Year 1,Year 2): Generate and communicate design ideas through describing, drawing or modelling, including using digital tools

• comparing and contrasting features of existing products to develop new ideas, for example designing and making a puppet with a movable part after experimenting with other toys with several movable parts
• communicating design ideas by modelling or producing and labelling 2-dimensional drawings using a range of technologies, for example designing a new environment such as a cubbyhouse or animal shelter and showing different views (top view and side view) with descriptions of materials and features
• communicating an opinion about their design ideas, for example expressing own likes and dislikes about a design idea for felt finger puppets including how they have made changes to their design ideas
• describing the results from exploring design ideas, for example recording the results from people taste-testing a food product

AC9TDEFP01 9.0 (Design and Technologies Foundation): Generate, communicate and evaluate design ideas, and use materials, equipment and steps to safely make a solution for a purpose

• identifying a purpose for designing and making a solution, for example the sand keeps blowing out of the sandpit, the birds keep flying into the waste bin and taking food scraps or people with disability need to know where they can park at school
• exploring ideas by drawing or modelling and choosing the most suitable idea, for example drawing or modelling designs for bee hotels to attract native bees to the school garden and choosing one to make, and changing perspectives from front view to plan view
• evaluating what they have made using personal preferences, for example using a smiley face Likert scale
• exploring how available materials can be used or re-used in construction play, for example using blocks and rain gutters or cardboard to make a ramp to roll a ball or toy car down
• practising a range of technical skills safely using equipment, for example joining techniques when making a product from materials, such as a greenhouse to keep a seedling warm or a trellis for holding up tomato plants
• assembling components of systems and checking they function as planned, for example making and testing a bowling, stacking or obstacle game with discarded food containers or packaging

Materials

The Shouting Girl by Steven Huynh
Large printed templates of calming spaces: Tent, sofa, box
A4 sheets of calming tool cut-outs: Soft toys, books, blankets, sensory bottles, headphones, mirror, sand timer, etc.
Glue sticks, scissors
Pencil or teacher-scribed sticky notes
Optional: emoji face cards from The Colour Monster or a feelings poster

Instructions

1. Warm-Up Discussion

Start with a brief conversation:
- What do you do when you feel shouty like the girl in the book?
- What helped her calm down in the story?
- Have you ever needed space to feel better?
- What helped you?
Show emotion cards and ask: What might help someone who feels like this?

2. Read-Aloud & Reflect

Read The Shouting Girl aloud.
Pause briefly to explore: What happened when the girl shouted? How did she feel before she shouted? What helped her calm down?

3. Introduce the Activity

Jim in the calm corner to reset his big feelings

Tell students: Today, we’re going to design our very own calm corner. It’s a quiet, safe space where you can go when you feel a big feeling—like mad, sad, or tired. We will use pictures to show what would help you calm down.
Show the template options (tent, sofa, box) and a sheet of calming tool cut-outs. Talk through each item briefly.

4. Calm Corner Design

Children choose their space template.
Cut and paste 4–6 calming items into the space.
Circle or put a star on the one they think helps the most.
Add a smiley face or personal drawing if they want.
Adults can assist with scribing or asking reflection questions:
- Why did you pick that one?
- What would you do with it?
- When might you use your calm corner?

5. Sharing & Reflecting

Invite a few children to share their calm corners with the class or in small groups.
Prompts: Tell us one thing you put in your calm corner. What helps you feel better when you’re upset?
Optional: Display the designs in the classroom as part of building a supportive environment.

Extensions

Thinking & Talking: Use feeling cards to match with calming tools: What helps this person feel better?
Role-play: Offer scenarios such as “You just had an argument with a friend.” “You feel tired after running.” Let children act out using their calm corner.
Model Making: If materials allow, move from paper to building a real calm corner with class input using soft items, cushions, and calm visuals.