Chill
Doing nothing is not always a relief. For many kids, the emptiness of a break feels uncomfortable, as if the body is searching for the next task. The visual support below shows concrete ways to wind down without it becoming a demand.
♀Chill
A person with brown hair sitting relaxed on a blue pillow.
About this visual support
A body that has been on the go all day does not always know what to do when the tempo drops. It looks for a button to press, a sound to listen to, something to fix. A moment on the sofa can then feel more like a vacuum than rest, and the child jumps up again after two minutes.
Visual support makes winding down concrete in the same way as any other activity. When the child can see that relaxing might mean lying under a blanket, listening to something calm, or staring at the ceiling for a while, the break becomes an actual choice instead of a grey zone. That is the difference between doing nothing and actively chilling.
One tip that often helps: tie the wind-down to a clear ending, like a song or a chapter of an audiobook. The body then knows that rest has a shape and a length, which makes it easier to let go. In the Routined app you can build a calm sequence with your own pictures and a timer, so the moment becomes as clear as any other routine.