45 Morning Affirmations for Kids

Morning affirmations are one of the easiest and most powerful skill you can teach your child today. In the Mindset Coaching and Transpersonal Hypnotherapy work that I do, I work quite often with positive affirmations.

Not only do morning affirmations shape the way your child will feel about herself and the day, but the neuroscience research behind positive affirmations teaches us that it shapes the emotional processing of the person and how we perceive ourselves.

Pretty cool stuff, right? The idea that something so simple as one or two sentences can have the kind of difference in our wellbeing is reason enough to teach your child how to have morning affirmations (and yourself too!)

This article will cover what morning affirmations are, how to introduce positive affirmations to your child, and give you 45 morning positive affirmations you can choose from daily.

What are morning affirmations for kids?

Morning affirmations are positive affirmations that your child will write or say to themselves each morning. If you have a young child that can’t yet write, you can write these for them.

Usually, we use positive affirmations when we need a boost or when we need to get over a complicated or challenging situation. And those are great times to use positive affirmations, but it’s far more effective to our emotional wellbeing when we use affirmations daily, regardless of what we are going through in our lives or the life of your child.

Using affirmations is a way of life is a good practice to begin early in life. Can you imagine a child growing up knowing affirmations and using them daily and having that ability instantly as they grow into adolescence and adulthood?

We, adults, have had to learn positive affirmations as adults, whereas your child will have to know to use this mindfulness tool as a child, as it becomes integrated into who your child is.

Are affirmations effective for kids?

You might wonder if affirmations can be effective for a child or even effective for adults. So, let’s discuss the neuroscience behind affirmations.

The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is the part of our brain that processes emotional, sensory, social, memory, and self-related information.

In this part of the brain, your child’s developing brain determines how they feel about themselves. For example, the ventromedial prefrontal cortex is where self-identity processing happens.

When your child has an experience with her peers or teacher, she uses the ventromedial prefrontal cortex to process the sensory of this experience and how she views herself within this experience.

The 2016 study, Psychological vulnerability and stress: The effects of self-affirmation on sympathetic nervous system responses to naturalistic stressors by Sherman et al., found that self-affirmations reduced stress’s health effects.

The study participants who had used affirmations for 14 days felt like a buffer to the stressor. Meaning they were not as affected by stress.

In another study done in 2014 by Cooke et al., the participants that used positive affirmations about physical activity had an increase in physical activity than those that did not use positive affirmations.

So again, the only difference between this and the previous study is the use of positive affirmations.

And yet another study, The Psychology of Change: Self-Affirmation and Social Psychological Intervention, by Cohen & Sherman, 2014 found that by using positive affirmations, participants were able to increase their self-esteem.

The same results in adults in the studies regarding affirmations can also be seen in children using affirmations. For example, the 1993 study, Perceived self-efficacy in cognitive development and functioning, by Bandura, showed that children who used self-affirmation improved their learning and academics in school.

Our brains have the unique ability to improve our health, reduce stress, increase our self-esteem and confidence, and so much more simply by using positive affirmations.

How do you introduce affirmations to kids?

The absolute best way to introduce affirmations to your child is by starting the practice of morning affirmations with your child. Meaning, both of you will do morning affirmations together.

Doing morning affirmations together is essential because children do not learn by what we say. Instead, they learn by what we do.

Also, it’s a lot more fun for a child to do this kind of activity with you, who so happens to be one of their favorite people, than on their own.

I do recommend that you both have your own sets of affirmations. And for you to also help your child create theirs if they desire your assistance.

Steps to Begin Morning Affirmations

1) Write the Affirmation

Writing the affirmation down each morning is an important step. It also adds thought and intention into the process. If your child cannot yet write, then you can ask yourself what the affirmation is for the day and then write it down for them.

I love having a chalkboard for these, but you can also use a journal to write the affirmation. Another idea is to have post-its that remain visually in your family’s living space.

2) Connect the Morning Affirmation with a Feeling

Ask your child what feeling they would like to connect with the affirmation. An excellent way to do this is to ask your child to describe their favorite feelings, see what it feels like in their body, and then say their affirmation as they experience the feeling at the moment.

3) Let Your Child Know They Can Tell Themselves the Affirmation During the Day

Just because it’s a morning affirmation does not mean they need just to say it in the morning. The more they repeat (in their head or out loud), the more effective it has. So, let your child know that they may use their affirmation as often as they desire.

45 Positive Morning Affirmations for Your Child

Now that you know the benefits of morning affirmations and how to introduce them to your child, I’m going to give you a list of 45 positive affirmations that you can use with your child (and for yourself).

If your child comes up with their own, that’s fabulous! However, if you or your child need a list to get your creative juices flowing, then feel free to use any of the ones below.