This set has 7 free printable feelings charts, and each one does a different job: a six-face chart for the youngest kids, a twelve-feeling chart for kids who have outgrown happy-sad-mad, a blank face they draw themselves, a 1-to-5 check-in for how big the feeling is, eight cut-out cards, a seven-day chart, and a blank version you fill in with your family’s own words. All black and white on US Letter, free to download with no signup.
These are everyday conversation tools, not therapy or diagnostic tools — a chart on the fridge that gives a child a word to point at. If you have a concern about a child’s emotional wellbeing, that belongs with a teacher, a pediatrician or a child psychologist, not with a printable.
All 7 feelings charts
Every page below has its own Download PDF and Print button.
Six feelings first, not twelve (ages 3-5)
The first chart shows six faces on one page — happy, sad, angry, scared, tired and excited — at roughly 1.7 inches across, with the word printed underneath in letters about a third of an inch tall.
I capped it at six on purpose. A three-year-old is choosing by looking, not reading, so the useful number of options is the number they can scan without giving up. Six faces at that size fill a US Letter page in two columns with room for the word under each one; twelve at the same size would not fit, and shrinking the faces to fit is the wrong trade at this age.
Twelve feelings for kids past happy, sad and mad (ages 6-10)
The second chart keeps the same six and adds six harder words: frustrated, proud, nervous, calm, lonely and silly.
Those six are the ones that usually get flattened into “mad” or “sad” when a chart only offers the basics — frustrated is not angry, and nervous is not scared. Each face on this page differs from every other in at least two features, not just the mouth: eyebrow angle, eye shape, mouth shape, and a small extra mark where one helps. Frustrated has gritted teeth and lowered brows; angry has the same brows but an open frown; nervous has raised brows, eyes glancing sideways and a wavy mouth. Drawing them that way is what stops a twelve-face chart from turning into twelve variations of one face.
A blank face kids draw in themselves
The “How Do I Feel Today?” page is one empty circle about 3.7 inches across, plus three prompts: “Today I feel”, “It started when”, and “What would help”.
Some kids will not point at a chart but will draw. The circle is drawn at a heavier stroke weight than the writing lines so the drawing area reads as the main event, and each prompt gets two lines to write on instead of one — a six-year-old writing by hand needs the room, and a short line quietly tells them a short answer is expected.
A 1-to-5 scale for how big the feeling is
This page is a five-step staircase: 1 calm, 2 a little annoyed, 3 frustrated, 4 upset, 5 very upset. Each step has a number, a face and a check box.
The wording here is deliberately plain. These are ordinary feeling words a family already uses, not clinical or program terminology, because the page is meant to be read straight off the fridge with no training. The steps climb from the bottom left to the top right, so the stack itself shows the number going up. The footer line says in plain words that there is no wrong answer, rather than leaving that implied.
Cut-out feeling cards for the fridge
This page holds eight cards on dashed cutting lines — happy, sad, angry, scared, tired, excited, calm and silly — two across and four down.
Cards go where a chart cannot: in a lunchbox, on a magnet, in a pocket, in a jar by the door. The dashed lines are printed in grey rather than black so the cut line stays visible without framing every card in a heavy border once it is cut out, and each card carries the face and the word together so a card that ends up somewhere on its own still means something.
Track a whole week, one feeling a day
The weekly chart is a grid of seven days by six feelings, with the day names written out down the left and small faces across the top.
The faces in that header row are drawn without their extra marks — no tear, no sleep letters, no sparkles — because six faces side by side in a header have no room for decoration, and the word underneath is already doing that work. The check boxes are drawn just under a third of an inch square — sized for a crayon rather than a pen — and the footer says more than one box a day is fine.
A blank chart for your own words
The last page is six empty circles with a write-in line under each.
No fixed word list fits every household — some use a word in a language that is not English, some use a nickname for a feeling, some need a word the printed charts simply do not carry. This page leaves both the face and the label empty, so the chart can end up in the words actually spoken in the house rather than the ones I picked.
Which chart to print for which age
For ages 3-5, print the six-face chart. For ages 6-10, print the twelve-feeling chart. Everything else layers on top of one of those two.
The blank-face page and the cut-out cards work at either age — the cards especially for a child who will pick something up but will not stand at a chart. The 1-to-5 scale needs a child who can already name a feeling, which is usually after the six-face chart has been in use for a while. The weekly grid and the blank chart are the two most useful at 6-10, where a child can look back at a week and see it for themselves.
What these charts are for — and what they are not
These pages are designed for ordinary use at home and in a classroom: a morning check-in, a word to point at, a card in a lunchbox. They are not a therapy tool, an assessment, or a way to diagnose anything, and nothing here should be read as clinical advice.
That boundary is a real one, and it is where my expertise stops. My background is in early childhood education, so what I can tell you about is the page: how many faces fit at what size, what stroke weight a small hand can follow, which word belongs at which reading level. Questions about a child’s emotional wellbeing, development or behavior over time belong with people qualified to answer them — a classroom teacher, a pediatrician, or a child psychologist.
How to print these
All 7 pages are US Letter (8.5 × 11 in) with half-inch margins and print in pure black and white, so no color ink is needed. Set your printer to “Actual size” rather than “Fit to page” — fit-to-page shrinks the faces and the check boxes together, and the boxes are already sized to the smallest useful crayon mark.
For repeat use, laminate the chart or slide it into a plastic sleeve and mark it with a dry-erase marker. The cut-out cards page is the one worth printing on cardstock if you have it; the dashed lines are drawn to be cut on, not folded.
FAQ
What age is a feelings chart for?
Roughly ages 3 to 10, but not the same chart across that whole range. The six-face chart is drawn for ages 3-5, where a child is choosing by looking rather than reading. The twelve-feeling chart is for ages 6-10, where words like frustrated and nervous are worth separating from mad and scared.
How many feelings should be on a chart for a preschooler?
Six is the number this set uses for ages 3-5. It is the most faces that still fit on a US Letter page at a size a preschooler can scan across the room, with the word large enough underneath to be read to them.
What is the difference between a feelings chart and a behavior chart?
A feelings chart names how a child feels; it has no scoring and nothing to earn. A behavior chart tracks what a child did — listening, kindness, handling frustration — usually across a day or a week. They answer different questions, and our printable behavior charts cover the second one.
Do you have emotions coloring pages too?
Yes, but they are a separate thing from these charts. The pages here are charts to point at and check off, not pages to color in. If coloring is what you are after, the Inside Out coloring pages are the emotion-themed coloring set on the site.
Can a child use this before they can read?
Yes. Every face on every chart is paired with its word, so a child who cannot read yet points at the face while an adult reads the word out loud. The six-face chart is drawn at the largest face size in the set for exactly that reason.
Is a feelings chart a therapy tool?
No. These are everyday communication printables — a way to give a child a word to point at during a normal morning or a hard moment. They are not designed for assessment, diagnosis or treatment, and they are not a substitute for professional support. If you are worried about a child’s emotional wellbeing, speak with their teacher, a pediatrician, or a child psychologist.
These pages sit alongside the rest of the printable charts and planners on the site. For the daily jobs and routines side of the fridge, see the morning and bedtime routine charts, and the behavior charts if what you need is a record of the day rather than a word for it.