Begin at Home

• • Show kids you love them by hugging them and telling them you love them.
  • Stop violent behavior in your home. Yelling, hitting, and threatening scares children and teaches them that violence is okay.
  • Catch them being good!

• Allow your children to be angry. Tell them it is okay to have bad feelings, but it is not okay to use violence to express them.
• Pay attention to the TV shows, movies, music, and video games your children enjoy. Watching violent programs and playing violent games affects children’s behaviors.
• Teach your children self-respect, respect for adults, and for other children. Say “please”, “thank you” and “you’re welcome”.

Keep children safe

Increasingly, children are being affected by violence on television, in video games, in music, in their homes, and communities. A child might even experience it directly by being a victim of violent acts. Both direct and indirect exposure to violence can have lasting effects on development.

We may want to believe young children cannot fully understand violent events that happen around them, and that they aren’t affected. This is wrong.

Even if violent situations are far too difficult for them to understand or they lack the verbal skills to express how frightened they are, they may still experience intense feelings of fear and loss.