This Feelings Frenzy emotions card game is a fun way to get kids to learn about and get comfortable with a whole range of emotions. This was originally a sponsored post.
I joke sometimes that I had kids just so I could keep playing with toys and enjoying animated movies without feeling guilty. I’m doing it for my kids is always a great excuse for anything, right?
After seeing the Inside Out movie, I was inspired to create this Inside Out emotions game we call Feelings Frenzy. This emotions card game printable is fun and easy for everyone.
How to Play the Emotions Game without Cards
I’ve used a version of this Feelings Frenzy emotions game to keep the wee ones occupied and entertained for years.
Whenever we travel and have to wait in lines (picture customs – whether I’m the mean mom or not, no electronics or phones are allowed until after you’ve cleared customs and that can be a long wait), I love playing the Feelings Frenzy emotions game with them.
When we’re out and about, I don’t need any materials, and it keeps us all giggling so that we don’t notice our line hasn’t moved at all and all the other lines have been speeding along.
All I do is call out an emotion and the wee ones have to show me what it looks like. When they were younger, I kept the Feelings Frenzy emotions game fairly simple. Joy, Anger, Fear, Surprise, and the like.
Those were all emotions they knew, and we had fun showing what the emotions were and how to express them (long before Mister Man was ever diagnosed with autism). Mister Man was our resident expert on fear.
While Little Miss was the queen of surprise.
As they got older, the Feelings Frenzy emotions game changed a little bit. I used it not just as a way to keep them occupied so they wouldn’t complain of being bored or get restless in a small space but also as a way to use their vocabulary.
That’s how we went from joy…
and sadness…
to confusion…
and awestruck…
and all sorts of other words that they may not run into every day at school.
They understand the idea behind disillusioned. And supercilious. And menacing. Plus mortified. There are so many more fun words that are even more fun to act out.
If they don’t know a word I throw out, there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s simply a teaching moment where they can tell me what they think it might mean and I can share how close they got and ensure they understand the correct meaning before they act it out for me.
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Feelings Frenzy Emotions Card Game
To make it more easily accessible, I formalized our Feelings Frenzy emotions card game a little more. That’s where this emotions cards game came in. I created a game you can print out on cardstock and use in two fun and creative ways to experience all sorts of emotions in a safe space at home as well as on the road.
Because kids have all different areas of knowledge, I created the Feelings Frenzy emotions matching game cards to have different levels of vocabulary to describe the emotions.
Each card has ten emotions listed on it. The “easy” green emotions have two cards while the more advanced yellow and more challenging red emotions have three cards each for a total of 80 emotions to use when playing.
How to print the game cards
Before I created this emotions card game, I searched Etsy to find a similar game but could not find one, so I created my own version of the emotion cards printable.
Click here to visit my Etsy store to get this printable for yourself.
Decide how many emotions and which level emotions you plan to use. There are two pages of easy emotions, three pages of intermediate emotions, and three pages of more complex emotions.
For each page of emotions you plan to print, print a copy of the second page of the PDF which is the back of every card in the game. I like to use thicker cardstock for these, but you can use regular printer paper if you plan to laminate them.
My favorite paper to use is at least 65 pound paper that will hold up to use without being so thick that it doesn’t take lamination well. This cardstock absorbs ink well and makes for vibrant colors, so it’s my favorite to use for projects like this.
Place those pages back into your printer so that the other side prints – and be sure you double check to make sure you put the paper in the right way, which is something I mess up constantly.
Once complete, you will have dual sided prints of the cards that line up perfectly for you to cut them.
To cut them, I recommend using a paper cutter to keep the edges straight and the card sizes equal. Note that you will need to trim some of the edges around the margin of the paper.
I have a several sizes of paper cutters, and when I cut letter size paper, my favorite is this compact 12 inch paper cutter. It works best on thicker paper versus standard copy paper, which is what I use for projects like this.
If you choose to print on standard paper, you almost need the full size paper cutter to support the paper and cut straight, where this one works great for cardstock and doesn’t take up a ton of space.
Because the wee ones are using all the words in the Feelings Frenzy emotions card game, I chose to print my cards all in black and white.
If you’re just learning words or moving to more challenging words, print them in color to help delineate which words are at which level. This works really well if you’re playing the games with children of different ages.
Once I have each card cut out, laminate it to ensure it lasts longer, especially if you use standard paper. I have a great laminator that works really well for projects like this, and they’re surprisingly affordable.
Simply line up your cards inside an 8.5×11 lamination sheet with enough space around each card to seal and allow you to cut them apart, then run it through your machine as it directs.
Pro tip: If you use just a little double sided tape to hold the card in place, it makes it even easier to ensure they don’t move around when you put the lamination sheet into the machine.
I like this lamination machine that again is compact and is perfect for any letter size project and doesn’t create bubbles in part because it seals with two separate rollers. The Amazon Basics lamination 3 mil sheets work great for this and are far more affordable than other brands.
Playing Emotions Card Game – Free Play
We came up with two fun ways to play the Feelings Frenzy emotions game. Actually, I came up with one, and after we’d played it with the cards a few times, Little Miss suggested the other game which has become a new favorite in our house.
Once you’ve printed your cards and cut them up, place them in a pile in a common area.
The game can be played on teams or each person for himself, depending on what works best in your house. When I play with them, I am the master judge, but this is also something kids can easily play on their own while you’re making dinner.
Or pop the cards in your purse with a rubber band wrapped around them for on the go fun and inspiration while you’re waiting in the carpool line, at a sporting event, or in a restaurant for the food that takes longer the hungrier everyone is.
One person selects a card and reads the emotion aloud. The rest of the players – or designated person from each team if playing on teams – then has to act out that emotion.
The judge determines who came closest to rendering the emotion, and you can choose whatever criteria you want to use, as this is all in good fun.
Whichever person or team the judge selects then gets to keep that emotions game card, and play continues with the next person and card until they’re all used. Whichever person or team has the most cards at the end wins.
Playing Feelings Frenzy Emotions Game – Memory Match
Little Miss came up with this genius idea for a second game using the same Feelings Frenzy emotions game cards. You will need to print a second set so that each emotion has two corresponding cards.
As with any memory game, you can set it up with as many or as few matches as you see fit. We found that 20 cards of 10 emotions worked best for us and our space, but we did do a monster 60 card version with the 30 red emotion cards just for fun.
Like a certain board game the wee ones know and love, that took forever to finish!
Just like the traditional memory match games, the goal is to find the matching emotions. Despondent and Indifferent in the example above are obviously not corresponding emotions, so the player turns the cards over and the next person takes a turn trying to find a match in the rows.
The twist to the Feelings Frenzy emotions game memory match is that once you create a match, you have to show that emotion before you can keep the cards. If you aren’t able to show your indifference, you have to turn the cards back over and the other player has a chance to steal the emotion in the next turn!
The winning player is the one with the most matches at the end of the game. And the fun is that it can be played as a solitaire game, which Little Miss did before school this morning just because it’s fun or with two or more players.
Because there are so many card options you can create – anywhere from just printing out two sheets of one Feelings Frenzy emotions game card to printing all seven sets of cards and having a massive 140 card memory match – this can work with three, four, or more players taking turns.
What is the benefit of this emotions game?
Best of all? The kids don’t realize that they’re learning.
It’s more than just the vocabulary. They’re learning how to recognize the emotions on others’ faces and how to express it themselves.
I tell the wee ones all the time that it’s fine to feel a certain way, that it’s how you express the emotion that matters. When Mister Man gets frustrated and throws a book (yes, that happened last night, why?), the throwing the book isn’t ok but it’s fine to be frustrated and express it in another way.
Bookmark this page to come print these emotion game cards again!
Don’t forget to grab your own printable version so you can play this game at home.
Looking for more fun printables?
I love playing games with my kids, and this road trip scavenger hunt is always a favorite. It’s so much more varied and fun than the ones that I used to play in the car when I was a kid on long road trips.
You may also enjoy this road trip bingo that is more creative than the simple ones we grew tired of after an hour. Like the emotions card game, it has multiple ways to play to keep you and your kids occupied for hours.
How do you learn to express your emotions?
How fun! I love that you created something that can be played multiple different ways at various different levels – great job! #client