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Home > Blogs > Springfield Schools News and Issues > Archives > 2009 > April > 12 > Entry
Helping kids cope
Local schools have been dealing with difficult blows over the last few weeks.
Graham lost three elementary students - Patrick Snelling, Breonna Snelling and Cassandra Karg - and two-year-old Nathan Skaggs, in a fire last month. This weekend, Emanuel Christian Academy lost senior Hannah Young in a car crash.
A couple years ago my cousins - who were about 8 at the time - brought a letter home from school about a classmate’s death. When my mother told me, I wondered how you talk to an 8-year-old about death, especially when it happens to a child.
Typically the schools will offer resources and trained counselors to help students and staff cope, but kids will still have questions, fears and grief when they get off the bus.
There are many organizations out there offering resources to help parents who aren’t sure how to help their children grieve. The National Institute of Health has a thorough guide to understanding what children may need and how they deal with loss (the second link under “Coping.”) North Dakota State University has a guide that breaks information down by age group to help parents decipher how much information to give their children, among other things.
A couple quick tips from those sites:
- Answer questions honestly. - Keep you child’s age and prior experience with death in mind when deciding how much to tell them. - Remember that, like adults, children will react to loss in different ways. - Let your child talk about their loss and their feelings. - If you are concerned about the way your child is coping, contact the school to find out what resources they might have available for students.
If anyone who has more advice for helping children understand death or has questions, leave them in the comments.
Permalink | Comments (2) | Post your comment | Categories: Parenting
Comments
By Terra Crable
April 14, 2009 10:28 PM | Link to this
Great ideas and tips in this blog. I believe another way we can help our children who deal with death, and other barrieBy Terra Crable
April 14, 2009 10:29 PM | Link to this
barriers to learning are to keep mental health supports in the schools. in the city, they will all be gone as of june. so sad.