EMOTIONS MATCHING GAME FOR KIDS
SEL Feelings Cards & Activities | Ages 3–8
Help children recognise, understand and talk about their emotions in a fun, playful and engaging way!
The Emotions Matching Game for Kids is a printable Social Emotional Learning activity designed for children aged approximately 3–8.
Through colourful emotion cards, matching activities, real-life situations and role-play, children can practise identifying feelings, connecting facial expressions with emotion words and talking about how different situations may make someone feel.
Milcho & Sherri guide children through the activities, making emotional learning friendly, visual and easy to understand.
WHAT'S INCLUDED?
This printable PDF contains 10 pages and includes:
• Cover page
• How to Use instructions
• 12 Emotion Cards
• Emotion matching worksheet
• Situation-based emotion recognition activities
• “What Happened?” activities
• “Act the Emotion” role-play activity
• Emotion word tracing
• Final thank-you page
12 EMOTIONS INCLUDED
The printable emotion cards include:
• Happy
• Sad
• Angry
• Excited
• Surprised
• Calm
• Tired
• Scared
• Shy
• Proud
• Bored
• Thinking
Each card features Milcho or Sherri showing a clear facial expression and body language connected to the emotion word.
This helps children begin to associate visual emotional cues with the correct vocabulary.
HOW TO USE THE GAME
The resource can be used in several different ways.
Children can:
• Print and cut out the emotion cards
• Match emotion faces with the correct words
• Use situation cards to decide how Milcho or Sherri might feel
• Talk about emotions using the discussion prompts
• Act out emotions for others to guess
• Trace selected emotion words
The activities can be completed individually, with an adult, in pairs or in small groups.
EMOTION RECOGNITION
The emotion cards are designed to help children recognise different facial expressions and emotional states.
Children can look carefully at the characters and discuss clues such as:
• Facial expression
• Body posture
• Tears
• Smiles
• Surprised reactions
• Calm expressions
• Tired body language
• Signs of fear or anger
This visual approach can help make emotional vocabulary easier for young learners to understand.
MATCH THE EMOTIONS
The “Match the Emotions” worksheet asks children to draw lines between the characters and the correct emotion words.
The activity includes emotions such as:
• Tired
• Surprised
• Happy
• Thinking
• Shy
• Calm
This activity supports:
• Emotion recognition
• Word-picture matching
• Visual discrimination
• Emotional vocabulary
• Concentration
WHAT HAPPENED?
The situation-based activities encourage children to think about how a character might feel after something happens.
Examples in the resource include:
“Milcho lost his favorite toy.”
Children choose between emotions such as Sad, Angry and Happy.
“Sherri got a surprise gift!”
Children choose between Excited, Surprised and Sad.
“Milcho is very tired after playing all day.”
Children choose between Tired, Thinking and Scared.
These activities help children connect emotions with everyday situations instead of simply memorising emotion words.
TALK ABOUT FEELINGS
The situations can also be used as conversation starters.
Adults can ask questions such as:
“How do you think Milcho feels?”
“Why do you think he feels that way?”
“How would you feel in this situation?”
“What could make Sherri feel better?”
“Have you ever felt like this?”
These conversations can support emotional awareness, communication and empathy.
ACT THE EMOTION
The “Let’s Play! Act the Emotion” activity turns emotional learning into a fun group game.
Children choose an emotion and act it out like Milcho or Sherri.
Other children or adults then try to guess the emotion.
The activity includes emotions such as:
• Happy
• Sad
• Angry
• Excited
• Scared
• Tired
Role-play encourages children to notice how emotions can be shown through:
• Facial expressions
• Voice
• Body movement
• Posture
• Gestures
This makes the resource useful for both learning and play.
EMOTION WORD TRACING
The role-play page also includes dotted emotion words for tracing.
This adds an early literacy and handwriting element to the activity.
Children can practise recognising and tracing emotion vocabulary while learning what each word means.
SKILLS CHILDREN CAN DEVELOP
This resource supports practice in:
• Emotional recognition
• Emotional vocabulary
• Self-awareness
• Social awareness
• Communication skills
• Empathy
• Speaking and listening
• Visual discrimination
• Matching skills
• Early literacy
• Word recognition
• Fine motor skills
• Pencil control
• Role-play
• Confidence
• Observation
• Social interaction
SOCIAL EMOTIONAL LEARNING
This printable resource can be used as part of Social Emotional Learning activities.
Children are encouraged not only to name emotions, but also to think about:
• Why someone may feel a certain way
• How situations can affect feelings
• How different people may react differently
• How emotions can be shown
• How to talk about feelings
This helps make the activities more meaningful than simple flashcard memorisation.
MEET MILCHO & SHERRI
Milcho & Sherri appear throughout the resource showing a variety of different emotions.
Their friendly appearance creates a consistent and playful learning experience and gives children familiar characters to observe and discuss.
PERFECT FOR
• Preschool
• Kindergarten
• Early Years
• Early primary learners
• Children aged approximately 3–8
• Social Emotional Learning
• Classroom activities
• Home education
• Learning centres
• Circle time
• Small-group activities
• One-to-one learning
• Calm-down corners
• Feelings discussions
• Morning activities
• Home learning
FOR TEACHERS, HOME EDUCATORS AND PARENTS
Teachers can use the emotion cards during circle time, SEL lessons, classroom discussions or small-group work.
Home educators can include the resource in social and emotional learning sessions.
Parents can use the activities to help children talk about feelings in a relaxed and playful way at home.
The resource can also be revisited whenever children need extra practice naming or discussing emotions.
HOW TO PREPARE
1. Download the PDF after purchase.
2. Print the pages.
3. Cut out the emotion cards.
4. Use them for matching, discussion and role-play.
5. Complete the worksheets.
6. Reuse the cards for future SEL activities.
For repeated use, the emotion cards may be printed on thicker paper or laminated.
PRODUCT DETAILS
• Product Type: Printable Emotions Matching Game
• Format: Digital PDF
• Total File Length: 10 pages
• Number of Emotion Cards: 12
• Age Range: Approximately 3–8 years
• Language: English
• Subject: Social Emotional Learning / Feelings
• Learning Focus: Emotion recognition, communication, empathy and social awareness
• Activities: Matching, situation-based learning, discussion, tracing and role-play
• Suitable For: Preschool, Kindergarten, Early Years and early primary learners
• Preparation: Print and cut the cards
• Delivery: Digital download
• Physical Shipping: None
DIGITAL PRODUCT
This is a DIGITAL DOWNLOAD.
No physical cards or other physical product will be shipped.
After purchase, you will receive the printable PDF file ready to download and print.
PLEASE NOTE
Adult guidance may be helpful when discussing the situation-based activities.
Colours may vary slightly depending on your monitor, printer, paper and printer settings.
This resource is intended for personal, home education or single-classroom use.
The digital files may not be resold, redistributed, shared, uploaded to other websites or platforms, or used for commercial resale.
Created with care by ZORI Cowgirl Creative Lab.
RECOGNISE • TALK • MATCH • PLAY
Help children build emotional vocabulary and confidence while learning about feelings with Milcho & Sherri!