Why Your Child Says Good or Bad for Every Feeling (And How to Help Them Express the Full Rainbow of Emotions)

Understanding the Good or Bad Phase

When children are five or six years old, they're at a fascinating point in their emotional development. They're experiencing a RICH inner world of feelings - curiosity, excitement, disappointment, pride, nervousness, delight - but they often lack the vocabulary to express these nuanced emotions. So they default to the broad categories they know: good and bad.

And here's what's beautiful about this: it's not a problem to fix. It's a starting point to celebrate.

Think of it this way. Your child has just learned the words "up" and "down." Over time, they'll gradually learn north, south, diagonal, sideways, and all the other direction words. But they start with the foundation - the big, broad-covering terms that can apply to lots of different situations. That's exactly what's happening with emotional vocabulary.

What Research Shows Us

Research from Leipzig University reveals something fascinating about how children develop emotional vocabulary. When children are four, five, or six years old, they typically use very basic, unspecific terms to describe their feelings. Words like "good," "nice," and "funny" for pleasant experiences, and "not good" or "bad" for unpleasant ones.

But here's the part that might surprise you: this developmental journey continues all the way through age eleven and beyond. Even ten and eleven year olds haven't fully mastered adult-like emotion vocabulary patterns yet.

"Learning to use language in an adult-like way is a long-lasting process. This may particularly apply to complex conceptual domains such as emotions."

— Dr. Gerlind Grosse and colleagues, Leipzig University

So if your five or six year old is saying "good" and "bad," they're right on track. They're at the very BEGINNING of a beautiful, gradual journey of emotional vocabulary development.

Why Emotional Vocabulary Matters SO Much

You might be wondering: does it really matter if my child can name their feelings with precision? Can't they just... feel them?

Here's where the research gets really WONDERFUL. Researchers from Oregon State University and the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence have found that children with richer emotional vocabularies show significantly better outcomes across multiple areas of development.

Children who can accurately name their emotions are:

• Better able to pay attention - When you can name what you're feeling, it's easier to manage those feelings and focus on learning
• More engaged in school - Emotional literacy supports academic engagement and persistence
• Building more positive relationships - When you can express your feelings clearly, you can communicate better with friends and family
• More empathic - Understanding your own emotions helps you recognize and respond to others' emotions

Think about it from your child's perspective. Imagine feeling a swirl of emotions - maybe you're excited about a new activity but also nervous about whether you'll be good at it - and all you have are the words "good" and "bad." It's like trying to paint a sunset with only two colors. You can do it, but you're missing so many beautiful shades.

"Cultivating a rich vocabulary allows children to pinpoint their emotions accurately, communicate effectively, and identify appropriate regulation strategies."

— Dr. Shauna Tominey and Dr. Susan Rivers

When your child can say "I'm feeling nervous about the presentation but also excited to share what I learned," they're not just communicating more clearly - they're developing emotional intelligence that will serve them for their entire life.

How Emotional Vocabulary Develops

The Magic Book has taught me something beautiful about how children learn emotion words: it's all about frequency and connection.

Research shows that the more frequently an emotion word appears in adult speech, the earlier children produce it in their own vocabulary. This means that YOU, as your child's most important teacher, have tremendous power to shape their emotional vocabulary simply by using rich feeling words in your everyday conversations.

Children also learn emotion words in a specific pattern. They start with broad-covering terms (like "good" and "bad") and gradually add more specific, nuanced words. It's a natural progression, like learning to distinguish between different shades of blue before you can name them all - sky blue, navy, turquoise, cerulean.

The Two Parts of Emotional Vocabulary

Here's something important the research reveals: children need BOTH a range of different emotion words AND an understanding of what those words mean. This includes:

• The word itself - "disappointed," "proud," "frustrated"
• What it feels like in the body - "My shoulders feel heavy when I'm disappointed"
• When to use it - "I feel disappointed when something I was looking forward to doesn't happen"
• How it's different from similar feelings - "Disappointed is different from sad - it's specifically about expectations"

This is why simply telling your child "use more feeling words" doesn't work. They need you to help them build those bridges between the physical sensation of an emotion, the word that describes it, and the situations where it applies.

Gentle Strategies to Expand Your Child's Emotional Vocabulary

The beautiful news is that you can help your child develop rich emotional vocabulary through simple, loving practices woven into your daily life. The Head Start Early Childhood Learning & Knowledge Center reminds us that "before children develop their emotional vocabulary, adults need to help them express their feelings" by consistently modeling and labeling emotions.

Here are strategies that actually work:

1. Connect Body Sensations to Feeling Words

When you notice your child experiencing an emotion, help them connect what's happening in their body to a specific emotion word. You might say:

• "I notice your shoulders are tight and your voice sounds frustrated. Are you feeling frustrated right now?"
• "I see you smiling so big and your eyes are sparkling. You look delighted! Is that how you're feeling?"
• "Your hands are clenched and your face looks tense. I wonder if you're feeling angry or maybe disappointed?"

You're helping them build that crucial bridge between the physical sensation of an emotion and the word that describes it.

2. Model Your Own Emotional Vocabulary

Share your own feelings throughout the day - not in a way that burdens your child, but in a way that models emotional vocabulary. You might say:

• "I'm feeling a little overwhelmed right now because I have a lot to do, so I'm going to take three deep breaths."
• "I felt so proud when I finished that project. My heart felt warm and light."
• "I'm feeling curious about what we'll discover at the museum today!"

When you do this, you're showing your child that all feelings are okay to have and to name. You're showing them that grown-ups have lots of different feelings too, and that we can talk about them.

3. Read Stories About Emotions Together

Stories are SUCH a powerful way to build emotional vocabulary because they show emotions in context. When you read together, you can pause and talk about how characters are feeling, what clues tell you that, and what words describe those feelings.

The Magic Book and I have stories specifically designed to help with this, and I'll share one of my favorites in just a moment.

4. Create an Emotion Color Chart

This is a beautiful activity you can do together. Ask your child: "What color do you think curious feels like? What about disappointed? What about proud?" Create a chart together where different emotions have different colors. This helps them start to see that the emotional landscape is rich and varied, like a whole rainbow of feelings, not just two colors.

5. Expand on Their Words

When your child says "good" or "bad," gently expand on it without correcting them. If they say "I had a good day," you might respond: "That sounds wonderful! Were you feeling happy? Excited? Proud of something you did?" You're not saying they're wrong - you're offering them more specific words they might use.

6. Practice Throughout Daily Routines

The more you embed emotion vocabulary into your daily routines - during meals, during play, during bedtime - the more those words become part of your child's natural vocabulary. It doesn't have to be a formal lesson. It's just part of how you talk together about life.