Social-emotional learning (SEL) storybook for boys + work book - aged 5–12, using a boy-and-therapy-dog friendship to teach children how to name feelings, ask for help, and cope with hard emotions.

“Words That Bite” is a warm, humour-filled storybook built around social-emotional learning (SEL) — the process by which children learn to recognise, understand, and manage their own emotions while building empathy and healthy relationships with others. The book follows Fedya, a boy navigating everyday childhood struggles, and his imaginary companion Barbos, a wise and gentle dog who appears in his dreams to help him make sense of what he’s feeling.

Each of the ten chapters tackles a specific emotional or social challenge that resonates with children this age: learning to hear the care behind a parent’s “no,” telling a dangerous secret from a harmless one, coping with teasing and unkind words, resisting the urge to compare yourself to others, understanding what envy is really trying to tell you, handling the sting of losing a game, repairing a friendship after a fight, moving past embarrassment and shame, and learning that someone else’s “no” is not a rejection of you.

Rather than lecturing, the book teaches through story. Barbos shares his own gentle, sometimes funny memories from his life as a young dog, drawing parallels that make abstract emotional concepts concrete and memorable for children. Ideas are explained through everyday images a child can hold onto — a hurtful word compared to a splinter, an unresolved secret compared to a stone in a pocket, envy compared to a small biting bug with something honest to say, shame compared to raw resin that either hardens or turns into amber. Each chapter closes with a short, practical “Barbos’s game” — a simple real-world exercise a child can try that day, making the book easy to use for reflection, discussion, or follow-up activities at home or in the classroom.

Written by a psychologist and canine-assisted (canistherapy) practitioner working directly with children coping with stress and anxiety, the book is designed for shared reading between children and the adults who care for them, and works equally well as an independent read for confident young readers. Its plain, lively language keeps complex psychological ideas accessible, while its themes — self-esteem, honesty, friendship repair, jealousy, disappointment, and self-acceptance — make it a natural fit for PSHE, circle time, bibliotherapy, counselling sessions, or general SEL curriculum support.

Teachers, school counsellors, and parents can use individual chapters as standalone discussion starters or read the book cover to cover as a longer SEL unit. Each story is short enough for a single sitting yet rich enough to prompt genuine conversation about feelings that children often find hard to put into words on their own.