Kids Safety At Home: What Your Children Need To Know

Our fam­i­lies are cor­ner­stones of our lives and their pro­tec­tion is of the utmost impor­tance. This espe­cial­ly rings true in regards to our chil­dren. While we do what we can to ensure their safe­ty at all times, there is more we can do to keep them safe. It is nev­er too ear­ly to start a dis­cus­sion with our chil­dren to teach them about safe­ty and secu­ri­ty. The fol­low­ing are some great safe­ty tips that our chil­dren need to know regard­ing keep­ing them safe at home and out in the world:

1. There is safe­ty in num­bers- Teach your chil­dren from a young age that there is safe­ty in num­bers. Imple­ment­ing a bud­dy sys­tem so that your child is nev­er unac­com­pa­nied can increase their lev­el of safe­ty.
2. Con­sid­er a loca­tion device- While we may teach our child about safe­ty in num­bers, inci­dents can still occur. There is always a chance that your child may wan­der off when you are out and about so you may want to con­sid­er a loca­tion device. These devices have GPS that can allow you to locate your child should they go miss­ing.
3. Dis­cuss pass­words- With tech­nol­o­gy rapid­ly advanc­ing, our kids are grow­ing up in a cyber age. This means that they will have access to var­i­ous accounts through the use of a pass­word. It is impor­tant to remind your chil­dren that they need to cre­ate strong pass­words that are dif­fi­cult to crack and they should pro­tect these pass­words.
4. Speak­ing of pass­words…- Your fam­i­ly should cre­ate and use a secret pass­word or code in the event of an emer­gency sit­u­a­tion. If a sit­u­a­tion should arise where your child feels uncom­fort­able, they should be able to use this secret code with you.
5. Teach them about strangers- When the time comes to leave your child at home alone, it is impor­tant to teach them about strangers. Make sure that they know to keep the doors and win­dows locked at all times when they are at home alone and to nev­er open the door to strangers. Cre­ate a safe house in the neigh­bor­hood that they can go to if there is a seri­ous prob­lem.
6. Make sure they know how to work your alarm sys­tem- If your child is at home alone or even with a sit­ter, make sure that they are aware of how to work your home alarm sys­tem. Teach them the code to dis­able it or how to trig­ger it in the case of an emer­gency.
7. Trust your gut- Encour­age your child to trust in their gut feel­ings. If they feel uncom­fort­able or sense dan­ger, teach them to acknowl­edge these feel­ings and make the nec­es­sary moves to be safe.
8. Call 911- Define emer­gency sit­u­a­tions to your child and tell them to call 911 if they feel their sit­u­a­tions war­rant it. Con­sid­er doing a role-play so your child feels com­fort­able call­ing 911 should they need to.

When advis­ing your chil­dren of the pre­ced­ing safe­ty tips, it is impor­tant how exact­ly your approach the top­ic of safe­ty. Be sure that you aren’t giv­ing them any stress or anx­i­ety about “stranger dan­ger” but rather are edu­cat­ing them about safe­ty. Reas­sure them that for the most part, peo­ple are good, but they just need to be aware of how to stay safe.