Consumer Critique: The Moodsters

The Moodsters, a first-of-its-kind brand of emotional intelligence (EQ) offerings and educational toys and books, has just launched a new extension to its current lineup nationwide on ToysRUs.com. The Moodsters teaches children vocabulary for feelings and strategies to manage emotions. I had a chance to look at a sample of the two new products. The Moodsters Feelings Notebook and Feelings Crayons Set comes with five jumbo crayons, with each color representing a different emotion, and a 50-sheet notebook for kids to draw and color their feelings. This helps kids, especially those who are visual learners, connect with their feelings and also explore feelings in art. The Plush Characters and Sticker Activity Books use the Moodsters detectives (Coz, Lolly, Quigly, Razzy, and Snorf) with their related emotions and help students name and verbalize happiness, anger, love, sadness, and fear. Each activity book helps kids explore a common emotion.

Helping kids put names on their feelings can help them process emotions that may be confusing. It can also help them react appropriately to situations around them, and recognize feelings that others are having. It's a great way to help young children, who often don't have the ability to explain exactly what they're going through, by at least giving them a tool to name their emotions.