How much did you tell your children about the terrorist attacks in London?

[expatkat]

I was very direct with my ds, who is nearly 6. I didn't mention that people had lost their lives, but if he'd asked, I'd have said so (I think).

If I had a more anxious sort of child, I might well have kept it from him, but it seemed the right thing to do for this particular child. (My 2-year-old is happily oblivious.)

I'm not entirely sure I did the right thing, but I'm comfortable enough with my decision.

How did you all handle it with your young children?

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Your poor ds, coppertop. If my son were as sensitive as that, I definitely wouldn't tell him either.

We told ours (7 and 5) that some people had let bombs off in London and some people had been badly hurt as a result.

DD(7) didn't want any more information whereas DS(5) wanted lots and lots of details - and pushed for some pretty gruesome answers! We tried to answer them honestly but minimally IYSWIM. So the 'how do bombs kill you' was answered by saying that they make cuts in your body which you lose blood through and if you lose too much blood you die. Also said that the doctors can mend the holes by stitching you up then give you some new blood - cue discussion about blood donation!

Frankly though the whole day was harrowing and a discussion of this nature was the last thing I felt like on Thursday evening but some questions need answering and can't be put off!

I was furious to a red mist degree when DD was in reception (4YO) and headteacher did a special assembly on 7/9 to remember all the people who died when some wicked people flew some aeroplanes into a big tall buidling! DH was travelling a lot with work at the time and DD used to be terrified that DH was going to be on a plane with bad people on it! FGS what was the point in a one minute silence for 4YO children!!!!

Oops should say 9/11 not 7/9!!!

I so think it's up to parents to talk to small children about this stuff, not up to preschools and teachers of younger children to decide how and when this information should be presented.

Ds1 was convinced that the sea was going to come in and wash his home away at any moment, even though we live miles away from the coast. I can only imagine what his reaction would be to the news that a bus had exploded. It probably sounds selfish but we rely on buses and literally can't afford for him to develop a phobia of them - as well as the distress it would cause ds1 himself.

Coppertop - that is exactly why parents not schools should control this info flow IMO!

Of course you can't tell a child who would be distressed by the situation what has happened. That would be so unfair on the child.

DD although older has always been a lot more sensitive to this kind of thing that DS - she would have quite upset by some of the details that DS seemed so keen to piece together. Stressing once again the importance of parenting for the specific needs of the child

soapbox, I'd have gone bananas if someone told my 4 yr old about 9/11. (That's similar to Ladymuck's story.)

There's a book that was written to explain 9/11 to NYC preschool children (& I suppose American children in general) about a cute little fireboat that's used to fight fires. The book describes, in innocent thomas-the-tank-engine fashion, how the boat came to built, what sort of fires the boat has been employed to fight, how beloved the boat is. . .and then suddenly you turn the page andBAMthere's this hideous drawing of 2 planes flying into the towers. I really think that book is a failureit's aimed at 3 & 4 yr-old FGSbut maybe it serves its purpose for the young, young children who were directly affected. In any case, I've only just told ds about 9/11, and that's because we live near Ground Zero when we're in NYC, and the absence of the towers is keenly felt around there. Also, ds was in NYC on 9/11 (though he doesn't remember of course) hence my theory that terrorism is going to part of his life, so he should start learning about it now, delicately. (Very delicately.) But I think you're doing absolutely the right thing, coppertop, it would be horribly distressing to your boy if he knew--no doubt. Much better to leave it for now.

When I collected minded schoolchildren, I had no intention of saying anything about it all (not my place to do so, unsure as to what parents would want to say) - except that one of them said they'd been listening to the radio in class, and she duly announced to all the children what she "knew" (her information was correct).

None of the other classes listened to the radio, not sure if this could really have happened???

Cue an explanation from me to children aged 3 - 10 years ... absolutely impossible.

Dd (3.9)father was in London that day and I thought if she heard anything about London her ears would prick up so I told her. I also knew it would be mentioned in church so I thought I should prepare her.

I told her that some bad people had tried to hurt some people in London, some people were so hurt that they had died and gone to heaven. Dd seemed to understand and even asked to light a candle for them in church and she spoke about the hurt people in our bedtime prayers.

She has been asking why some people are bad which is hard to answer. I just said that some people didn't have good mummy's and daddys so hadn't been taught how to be good and that just as some children at school are naughty and hurt each other so adults do the same. A bit of a crap answer but what do you say?

I can remember dd was very upset by the children who were held captive in Russia, I had the TV on in the living room and had gone upstairs. The footage came on off the children being shot and fleeing the school, dd was just so upset.

ds1, just 4, remembers London very well and he did see the image of the bus on tv, clocked it and asked was it London and what had happened. I told him a miner had left some dynamite on the bus by accident and it exploded but the firemen had put out the fire

Thank the Lord we told him dh was in America and not London.

The truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth.

Until October, our family lived two blocks from Russell Square and we took the #30 bus to school every day. The sub-warden at the international college where we were resident remains missing.

We have since moved back to Canada but many of our friends are still in London. DDs best-friend still attends the same school in Westminster and I felt that I could not keep this unfortunate series of events a secret. DS1 and DD can both read so every newspaper was telling the story for me even if I had chosen not to mention it.

We also chose to tell our children about the September 11th events because children at their school had fathers working in New York and there were people crying outside their school when we went to collect them.

I firmly believe that children are very aware of tension around them and that they are far less afraid of reality when it is presented to them by a loving parent. I think that the children who are protected or shielded from these real life events often have greater fears of the unknown than the informed children do of real risks.

Having said that, age appropriate information is all that is required. If an adult answers only the questions that a child asks as honestly as they can then that child learns to trust that adult.

I have not read any of the other responses yet but I am living in fear of being condemned for my views on this sensitive subject. I do however, have broad shoulders where honesty, integrity, maturity and especially reality are concerned so I can take it!

Cadmum
would you really give the whole truth? There are some things I'd rather they didn't know - especially about what's going on at Russell Square now. Were you at William Goodenough?

Binkie: I like 'the bombers got their religion wrong. The religion they have is not a religion about hurting people: properly it's like other religions - about thinking how to be good'. We live in an area of London with few Muslim families - I'd like to be able to express solidarty with the Muslim community in London but I don't know how. After this I feel more inclined to find out about Islam than I did before, to identify the terrorists' claims about Islam as a perversion of a religion. Anyone got any ideas on where to begin?

It took me 3 hours to walk home from the City so by the time I got home my DD (7) already knew from school. We had a chat because I knew she would hear more at school the next day. I think honesty is the best policy, but I don't let her watch it on the news and I don't bring newspapers home because they are too graphic in my opinion. My Ds1(nearly 4) I only told that there had been some naughty people up in London, but that they were now gone. Luckily they don't discuss it in his nursery.

My 4 yr old caught bits of it on the news while I was watching - too transfixed to think about sheltering her. She asked what was going on and so I told her in very basic terms - some very bad people had tried to hurt some other people a long long way away. We talked about how the wonderful ambulance men and women took the hurt people to hospital and the doctors and nurses helped to make them all better again (didn?t mention people had died) and that the police men were looking for the baddies so that they can tell them off and make sure they say sorry. It is so hard knowing how to pitch it, to shelter them but not lie to them. Parenting isn?t easy is it? Can?t imagine how those who were more directly involved coped with discussing it with children, let alone break the news that someone close was missing - very hard.

At our school children were not told till they had left the grounds. So we all had a choice in how to deal with it. DD watches the news with us, and understood it all. She thinks the people who did this "have a sickness in their brains".?

nothing, I am not telling them anything (they are almost 6 and 4 and havent heard it off anyone else either)

and coppertop, we rely on buses too so i dont want them worrying (not thet dd would understand but you never know)

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expatkat - yes i did agree with it. i thought that it was handled in delicate but not namby pamby way, they explained the facts and then focused on the people who had been injured or lost their lives to the attacks.
it has opened up a whole subject as to why do people do this to each other and why does god allow this to happen, but teacher handled this by explaining about the different religions and not everyone beleiving in the same god and some people/groups of a religion, beleive that what they are doing is condoned by their god. which is probably a bit to reliant on religion and god for me but again it is was told in a way that junior school children would understand.
it was also mentioned that some people might seek revenge for what these people have done and that too is wrong because 2 wrongs don't make for a right!

My dd is just 4, and in my opinion that's just too young to be told anything about the bombings at all. I didn't have the news on at all on Thursday purely so that she wouldn't see and be affected by some of the very disturbing images that they showed. Even if she could understand about bombs and terrorism on some level, I just feel that to have exposed her at this age to such pictures and words would have been the wrong thing to do.

Her pre-school was very good, the staff usually have the radio on over the lunch breaks but didn't on Thursday as they didn't feel it was appropriate for 3 and 4 year olds either. They haven't mentioned anything about it at all.

Had she been older I'm sure that I would have spoken to her about it, but I just feel that at 4 she has enough irrational fears without me adding to them.

I agree with Cadmum about answering questions children ask as honestly as you can, in a way that is appropriate for their age. My DS (5) asked what had happened and we told him some nasty people had bombed some other people in London and some of them had die. He didn't seem too insterested in pursuing it further - other than checking is London in this country (meaning is it near us). He was very interested in the aftermath of the tsunami - probably because of the graphic TV images which, tbh, he caught by mistake, so I had to explain. I also had to tell him then that children had died (as he saw that pic of the father carrying his baby through the waters) and that affected him to the point of tears. Didn't give him nightmares, but I think he began to understand that life isn't always nice.

I wouldn't watch graphic images of disasters with DS1 by choice, but sometimes we do watch the news and he asks questions. I find as long as I answer as honestly as I can, without going into too much detail, and he gets an answer to his question that satisfies him, he stops asking.

I wouldn't talk about it with children much younger than 5 though. And certainly not at pre-school. Although I do remember when DS1 was at preschool they held a sponsored silence for 9/11. DS would only have been about 18 months, but I wonder what they told the 3 and 4 year olds?

Mine (5,3) dont know a thing about it and won't if its up to me. If they find out from somewhere else then I'll play it down if I can.

Podmog, you should be so proud of your school.

I think I saw a very brief news item about a Muslim group holding a vigil outside St Mary's Hospital in Paddington to show their concern and solidarity. That sort of thing needs high-profile reporting, I think.

(We are still making assumptions though, aren't we? Apart from the slightly half-baked website claim, is there any confirmation of who the perpetrators were?)

I told my six year old directly, but without any gory details and he immediately drew a picture with lots of red and black in it. Told me this was a picture of an explosion. Wasn't sure whether this was a good thing, ie his way of processing it, or not. Interesting that he doesn't seem to have made connections like 'But we go on the tube, mummy. Will it happen again?' which would be very characteristic of him. Maybe it's just too awful for his little mind to get around.