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Helping your kids Understand Tragedy in Haiti and Elsewhere

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With all that is happening in the world right now I thought would post some tips on helping children understand tragedy. These tips come from Charlotte Reznick PhD a child educational psychologist.

-Talk to your children and provide simple, accurate information to questions. Allow them to tell and draw their stories about what happened.

-Talk with your children about your own feelings.

-Listen to what your children say and how they say it. Try to acknowledge the underlying feelings in their words and their actions. For example: “I can see it makes you sad to think about all the people who were hurt by this earthquake.” This helps both you and the children clarify feelings.

-Reassure your child: “We are together. We are safe. We will take care of you.”

-Be honest and don’t deny the seriousness of the situation. Saying to a child: “Don’t cry, everything will be okay,” does not reflect how the child feels and the child knows that, at least in the immediate future, this is not true.

-Respond to repeated questions. You may need to repeat information and reassurances many times.

-Hold your child. Touching is especially important for children when they are distressed.
-Observe your child at play. Listen to what she says and how she plays. Frequently children express feelings of fear or anger while playing with dolls, trucks, or friends.

-Have your child imagine not only how it “feels” to be safe, but what it looks like, what sounds she hears, what smells she detects. Evoking as many senses as possible will make the experience seem real.

-Provide play, art, and writing games to relieve tension. You can have him act out, draw, or write out a positive outcome for the situation.
-Plan something practical that your child can do to help (do a pennies fundraiser at school or draw a picture memorializing a person who may have died).

-Resolving all of the feelings related to the disaster may take your child (and you) quite a while. It is normal for a child to bring up the crisis long after it has happened and when you least expect it.

Charlotte Reznick PhD is a child educational psychologist, an Associate Clinical Professor of Psychology at UCLA, and author of the LA Times bestselling book The Power of Your Child’s Imagination: How to Transform Stress and Anxiety into Joy and Succes.s

Disclaimer: These tips were sent to me and I thought they would be useful. I was not compensated in any way to post them and was have not read any of Dr. Reznick’s books.

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Comments

  1. What a great post!!! I think it’s so important for all of us to understand tragedy like this – we’re all grateful for what we have..

    Thanks for stopping by!!

    xoxo

  5. what a wonderful list and so insightful!

    I love your site!

    think I will stick around… follow

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