Anger Volcano Worksheet (PDF) & Craft Activity

Anger Volcano Worksheet, Story, and Activity: Help your kids understand their angry feelings and manage their “anger explosions” with this fun anger management tool. 

Anger is a normal emotion that everyone experiences, but our kids need to learn healthy anger management skills to deal with this emotional state. 

The Volcano activity is a great tool to help children learn about anger, recognize anger triggers and understand the role of suppressed or hidden emotions resulting in uncontrolled anger.

Anger Volcano Metaphor

We often use metaphors to explain complex concepts because they allow us to convey abstract ideas in a more relatable and understandable way.

The Anger Volcano is one of those examples. 

The Anger Volcano is a valuable resource that uses visual analogies to help children understand and manage intense emotions.

Inside the volcano, the magma represents not just anger but a mix of many emotions bubbling beneath the surface. Just as real magma is a combination of various molten materials, the emotions inside us can include, frustration, sadness, fear, guilt, or disappointment, to mention a few.

As in a real volcano, if not managed, the pressure increases until it erupts, symbolizing an outburst of anger. 

The anger volcano analogy can also help kids understand that what we see as anger may be other feelings that manifest as anger, or a combination of different feelings mixed together. Also, certain triggers can cause these emotions to surface and lead to an explosion of anger.

In today’s article, we are going to explore two different anger activities based on the anger volcano metaphor:

• Anger Volcano Worksheet. 
• Anger Volcano Craft Activity

Anger Volcano Worksheet (Digital Download)

This anger worksheet starts with a kid-friendly explanation of the anger volcano concept and how an erupting volcano is similar to a kid having an emotional outburst.

It explores some key concepts:

• Emotions-magma: the emotions inside us can include, frustration, sadness, fear, and shame, guilt and many others.
• Anger triggers that may lead to the volcano eruption.
• Anger signs or “eruption signs” and how they are similar to our own expressions of anger.

Learning about all these concepts puts us in an ideal position to discuss and brainstorm ways to relieve the tension and develop effective anger coping strategies.

This free Volcano Anger Worksheet is available for download at the end of this post. 

Anger Volcano Activity (Play Dough): The Volcano Eruption!

The anger volcano can also be turned into a fun, interactive activity to help kids understand and manage their anger (a few years back, the anger volcano playdough activity was a “staple” in my son’s school soothing activities plan). 

This activity uses the volcano metaphor as a visual support to illustrate how anger can build up and eventually explode if not properly managed.

Step-by-Step Anger Volcano Activity

1. Materials Needed:  

To create your volcano, you’ll need playdough, a small plastic bottle (optional), baking soda, vinegar, red food coloring, dish soap, and a container big enough to fit the volcano (to avoid a big mess when the volcano explodes!).

2. Building the Volcano: 

Shape the play dough around the bottle to form a volcano (you can also do it without the bottle).

Make sure the bottle opening remains accessible. 

You’ll need a broad plastic container to place your volcano on so that it stands securely and doesn’t make a mess. In our activity, I added blue water around our volcano so that it would look like an island.

This part of the activity is fun and engaging, allowing kids to enjoy the creative side and the soothing sensory inputs from handling the playdough.

3. Exploring the Volcano Metaphor:

Lava as Anger: Explain to the children that the lava inside the volcano represents anger. Like lava, anger can build up inside us when we encounter frustrating or upsetting situations. 

Pressure Build-Up: Discuss how a volcano’s pressure increases until it erupts. Similarly, when we don’t express our anger in healthy ways, it can build up until we have an emotional outburst.

4. Demonstrating the Eruption:

Mix baking soda, red food coloring, and a few drops of dish soap in the bottle. You can add labels to these ingredients with different emotion names, such as “sadness” for baking soda, “frustration” for red food coloring, and “anxiety” for dish soap. This reinforces the volcano metaphor that you have just explored.

For this specific activity, we wrote down some anger-triggering emotions on paper notes:

• Baking soda was “My brother is using our IPad”
• Dish soap was “I’m tired”
• Vinegar was the trigger. I had already mixed the vinegar with red food coloring for our activity. I wanted our trigger to be red, as this color often represents feelings of anger. In our paper note, we wrote: “Trigger: I’m not allowed to watch TV”

After you mix baking soda and dish soap (and the food coloring if you have it as a separate ingredient/emotion), pour in vinegar. The chemical reaction causes the mixture to erupt like a volcano and will represent the anger eruptions.

Visualizing Anger: This visual and dramatic eruption helps children see how unexpressed anger can suddenly explode if not managed properly.

5. Calm-Down Strategies: 

Recognizing Triggers: Teach children to identify what triggers their anger. Understanding these triggers can help them anticipate and manage their reactions.

Calming techniques: Brainstorm techniques that may help “cool down” their anger before it reaches the eruption point.

Some examples of calming strategies for kids are:

• Deep breathing exercises
• Slowly counting to ten
• Relaxation techniques, like tensing and relaxing their fist
• Talking about their feelings
• Engaging in physical activities like running or dancing.

Role-Playing: Use role-playing scenarios to practice anger coping skills. For example, act out situations where the child can practice recognizing their anger and using a cooling down strategy.

6. Reflecting on the Experience:

After the eruption and the cooling-down exercises, discuss what the children learned. Ask them how they felt during the activity and what strategies they think will work best for them in real-life situations.

Anger Volcano Pack Download

Fill in your details and get your Anger Volcano PDF, which includes a volcano story and a volcano worksheet.

Other Social-Emotional Learning Resources for Anger

• Anger Workbook for Kids
• Anger Iceberg Printable for Kids
• Free Anger Thermometers for Kids
• Wheel of Emotions Printable for Kids
• Mood Charts for Kids
• Fun Ways to Use Feelings Cards