Trauma-Informed Coping Skills Worksheets

Twelve trauma-informed worksheets — paced for gradual exposure, never for flooding.

$12One-time · printable download · lifetime use

A standalone worksheet pack drawn from the TF-CBT track’s relaxation / affect modulation and cognitive-processing lanes. Designed for the clinician running gradual exposure over a longer arc: each sheet is a single component, on a single page, with a safety anchor the teen names before any trauma work begins.

Built for

The teen whose body has been on alert long enough to mistake normal arousal for danger — and whose visit needs to stay gradual, never flooded.

Cue.The intake form carries a safety flag the parent or referrer didn't know how to word — the visit opens on arousal that's already in the room, not a recap of last week's homework.
Body.The window inside the visit shrinks the moment the topic lands; incline stalls if arousal climbs, cognitive processing unhooks when the band drifts up, and the narrative lane doesn't open until a graduated arc has earned it.
Skills.A safety anchor the teen names first, a removed-means prompt before any trauma work, and one PRACTICE component per visit — paced for gradual exposure, never full flooding within a single hour.

What's inside

Seven single-page worksheets, one PRACTICE component at a time.

Every sheet below is one component, on one page, with a safety anchor the teen names before any trauma work begins. Drop them in across an arc of visits or run a single psychoeducation + affect-modulation pair inside one 50-minute session.

Goals

What the clinician keeps pacing the visit against.

Land one PRACTICE component per visit — psychoeducation, relaxation, affect modulation, cognitive coping, narrative, in vivo mastery, or conjoint — so the arc stays gradual instead of compressed.
Open every session on a safety anchor the teen names themselves, never on a recap of last week's content; remove means and name a coping adult before any trauma work begins.
Rehearse affect modulation at a manageable arousal band first, so the body lands in the regulation window before the cognitive lane opens; never flood inside a single visit.
Hand a caregiver-conjoint share-back card to the home so a trusted adult carries the same vocabulary between visits, not just the teen.

Materials

What you print or screen-share before the visit starts.

Safety-plan card (named adult, removed means, code phrase)
Body-below-the-band psychoeducation one-pager
Affect-modulation rehearsal sheet (breath retraining + SAFE-style)
Cognitive-processing worksheet (thought / evidence for / evidence against / balanced)
Narrative-thread card (4x6, blank front + guided back)
Caregiver-conjoint handout (PRACTICE "C" + "E" share-back)
Gradual-exposure pacing sheet (predict / actual / delta)

Script

The 50-minute clinician run, in order, with arousal-band notes.

01Open (5 min) — safety anchor card comes out first; the teen names the trusted adult and the code phrase before any worksheet opens.
02Activity 1 — body-below-the-band psychoeducation, then affect-modulation rehearsal; clinician tracks arousal, not time, and pulls back if the band drifts up.
03Activity 2 — cognitive-processing worksheet on a low-stakes thought the teen chose; one column per row, no narrative yet.
04Activity 3 — narrative-thread card, blank front only; the back of the card returns next visit, never on the same day.
05Close (5 min) — caregiver-conjoint share-back gets named out loud by the teen; pacing sheet gets the predict column filled, the actual column waits until next visit.

Activities

The seven printable pieces — drawn straight from the catalog so the card and the page never drift.

Safety-plan card (named adult, removed means, code phrase)
Body-below-the-band psychoeducation one-pager
Affect-modulation rehearsal (breath retraining + SAFE-style)
Cognitive-processing worksheet (thought / evidence for / evidence against / balanced)
Narrative-thread card (4x6, blank front + guided back)
Caregiver conjoint handout (PRACTICE "C" and "E" share-back)
Gradual-exposure pacing sheet (predict / actual / delta)

Closing

Take-home rhythm so the gradual arc survives the week between visits.

Safety anchor card travels home in the teen's pocket, not the parent's bag — the teen names the trusted adult themselves.
Caregiver-conjoint handout goes to the home so the trusted adult carries the same vocabulary between visits.
Gradual-exposure pacing sheet lands the predict column at the buzzer; the actual column waits until next visit, never the same evening.
Narrative-thread card front fills on day one, the back fills next visit — never the same afternoon.

Clinical arc · Safety / Affect modulation / Cognitive processing / Gradual exposure

Tied to the TF-CBT track

The same Safety / Affect modulation / Cognitive processing / Gradual exposure arc that anchors the catalog entry — not a generic mindfulness deck dressed up as a trauma pack.

Every sheet maps to a TF-CBT PRACTICE component — psychoeducation, relaxation, affect modulation, cognitive coping, trauma narrative, in vivo mastery, and the conjoint session that closes the arc with a trusted adult in the room. The gradual- exposure pacing sheet sets the rule we never break inside any single visit: arousal band tracked before time, narrative lane never forced on the same afternoon, the conjoint window opened only after the safety anchor has held. Clinicians running the Anger Regulation kit can stitch the same body-cue break into the affect-modulation rehearsal, and the predictability-map vocabulary from the back-to-school visit gives the in-vivo mastery sheet a common language for grading exposure.

TF-CBT Trauma · Practice components

Grief · Safety anchor

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