What Are The Zones of Regulation?

The Zones of Regulation is a widely used approach that helps children understand and manage their emotions, known as self-regulation. It teaches them to recognise how they’re feeling, why they might feel that way, and what strategies they can use to return to a calm, focused state ready for learning.

Children learn to identify four colour-coded Zones:

• Blue Zone – Low energy: sad, tired, bored.
• Green Zone – Calm and focused: happy, ready to learn.
• Yellow Zone – Heightened alertness: excited, silly, worried.
• Red Zone – Intense emotions: angry, overwhelmed, out of control.

All Zones are normal and expected. The aim is to help children recognise their Zone, and use tools to manage their emotions effectively.

We talk about the Zones across the whole school through assemblies, lessons, PSHE and everyday language. This helps children build emotional awareness, empathy, resilience and problem-solving skills.

How You Can Support at Home

• Use Zone language to describe your own feelings.
• Help your child identify their Zone and choose calming strategies.
• Talk about emotions in books, films, or daily life.
• Create a ‘calm box’ with items that help your child self-regulate.
• Praise your child when they recognise and manage their emotions.
• Use the 'toolbox' at the bottom of this page. 

By working together, we can help children develop lifelong skills for emotional wellbeing and success.