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Charlotte Talks: How To Talk To Kids About Traumatic Events

Charlotte Talks Mike Collins Logo

Tuesday, August 27th, 2019

We live in a time when maintaining a child’s innocence is difficult.  As the number of mass shootings continues to rise, parents, teachers and other caregivers are struggling with how to talk to children about these traumatic events.  Since you can’t completely shield kids from the world, we meet with some behavioral science professionals to get advice on how to approach this task. 

On the next Charlotte Talks...

News is all around us, and disturbing news of traumatic events is increasing. Mass shootings, school shootings, terrorist attacks, weather related disasters, bombings and other events are frequently occuring, and it's hard for grownups to cope, so how do we help our kids?

The struggle includes whether to talk to young children at all about mass shootings, how much to talk to older kids, and what kinds of conversations we should be having with kids about violence.

Mike Collins talks to two experts about how to open the line of communication with kids in an age-appropriate way to help them cope with traumatic events that are hard even for adults to understand. 

Guests:

Dr. David Schonfeld, director of the National Center for School Crisis and Bereavement at the University of Southern California.

Dr. Robin Gurwitch, professor in Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences in the Duke University Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and the Center for Child and Family Health.

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