Coping with Tragedy

As we all struggle to make sense of the recent tragedy affecting our country, our city, and our families, we are comforted to know that you all are safe, and hope that your loved ones are safe as well. The time we were forced to take off gave us all a moment of pause to reevaluate our priorities and to comfort ourselves and our loved ones.

As adults, we are going through a very difficult time trying to understand what is going on, identify and cope with our emotions, and restore a sense of personal safety. This is a tremendous task for an adult who has a lifetime of experience in dealing with what life has to offer. One can only imagine what the process of understanding these same thoughts and emotions is like for a young child.

As professionals who are experienced in understanding how children think and process events, we are speechless when asked how children will interpret the events of this week. One can only do what feels right and safe for ones family. They dynamics of each family will guide your manner of collectively coping with your grief and sense of security.

At school, we will be flexible and compassionate when dealing with children’s sense of curiosity and emotional understanding. It is important for us to remember that very young children have a skewed understanding of the information they receive, and a limited understanding of time, space, and scale. They use their past experiences to interpret their present information, and most children do not have a fraction of the experience one needs to comprehend such a massive event.

First, children will pick up on the change in tenor of the atmosphere. Children are sensitive to the tension, worry, and fear of the adults in their company. As compassionate human beings it is important for us to acknowledge these feelings and help children understand how to be consoled (by hugging and talking about how they feel), rather than hide them. We can acknowledge to children that we feel sad and scared sometimes too, “but our families can help us feel safer.”

We will not take the initiative of announcing the details of the tragedy with the children. We will, however, respond to their questions, comments, and reactions. We will allow children to talk about what they know, as this allows them to take control of the information they have been receiving and begin to form an understanding. When we allow children to share the information, they often talk about it in a way that children understand. Their very language feeds us the language that we can use to help them understand. As children talk about what they know, we will comfort them, validate them, and correct any information that perpetuates inaccuracies. As we have been doing during phase in, we will continue to make supporting the children emotionally our priority. The challenge they face now is to feel safe, comfortable and in control of their lives. We will not be adding new challenges for the children by introducing new curriculum, for the time being.

Some parents have been wondering how to share their feelings or information with their children without overwhelming them or inadvertently making them feel unsafe. It is reasonable to tell children that “there was an emergency in a building kind of far from here, and a plane crashed, and a lot of people got hurt.” It is important to reassure children that we adults will keep them safe. “Lots of police officers and fire fighters and doctors and nurses are making sure that no one else gets hurt.” Some children will ask or know that people have died. It is important to answer these questions as honestly and simply as you can, without giving children more information than they asked for. If you choose to talk about the incident with your children, it is best to find out what they know first and use that as a gauge for what they are ready to understand.

Please remember that children absorb much more of the adult conversation that goes on around them than we often expect. If you talk about the incident in their presence in words they cannot understand, you are not hiding the information from them, only limiting their ability to fully understand that information. They will take in bits and pieces and form their own understanding. It is very important to give children the impression that we are not hiding things from them, as they will feel that they cannot share what they know and what they feel aloud with you.

Please refrain from having adult conversations in the classroom, but know that you are welcome to call us or spend time at the Center after dropping your child off or before picking them up. We will also be making the Center available for any of you who might like to gather in the evening. Please call us before 7pm, and we will leave things open for you. During this time, we all need to find support where we can.

Best wishes.