Stranger Danger: Safety Tips for Your Little One

Remember when your mom and dad warned you to never talk to strangers or take candy from them? Life was much more simple back in the day, it seems. Today’s challenges for raising kids safely and teaching them to be safe are much greater than our parents probably ever faced. Jennifer Lundy-Aguerre (MFT), from La Mesa, California-based Positive Change Counseling Center (www.pccounselingcenter.com), says “Teaching your children how to be safe doesn’t have to be a scary experience. Build it in to their everyday lives and that awareness will become natural for them.”


1. Reinforce the meaning of “Stranger Danger.” Don’t expect that your children will remember the rhyme and instantly understand all its ramifications. It’s an effective teaching tactic to tell your child that he’s only allowed to speak or interact with a stranger if his parent or an adult that he trusts says it’s OK and everything else is off limits. After the interaction it can be helpful to explain why the child was or was not allowed to speak with the stranger as a teaching moment.


2. Teach your child to dial 911 and make sure he understands why, when and how to do it. For younger children, if you have a landline, post “9-1-1” on the phone, or consider making it your screensaver on your cell phone.


3. Equip your child with a siren/alarm or safety whistle and show her how to use it and why.


4. Teach your child never to trust strangers who tell them their parents are hurt or in some other form of emergency situation. This is a common diversion tactic that can fool some children – and even some adults.


5.Never enter, or go near, a car or a house without a parent or guardian present. “This should be a hard and fast rule above all else,” Lundy-Aguerre says.


6. Don’t think that stranger danger is limited to face-to-face contact. In the age of technology, cyber-bullying and stalking are new threats that we-and our parents-never had to encounter. Teach your child to never communicate with strangers via text messages, cell phones or e-mail. Just because your child can’t physically see the stranger doesn’t mean the interchange is harmless. Lundy-Aguerre notes that you should “Periodically check in to ask if this is happening with your children.”


It IS crucial that children understand that certain strangers, such as police, EMTs and firefighters, are not usually dangerous. But even in the circumstance that a child sees someone in uniform, it’s important that the child sees other policemen, EMTs and firefighters along with emergency vehicles and not just one “lone” uniformed person. While this is not an automatic red flag, it is a point to make your child understand that there are strangers in the world who will go to great lengths to gain access to vulnerable people and cause harm to them, even if it means impersonating uniformed personnel. Lundy-Aguerre adds, “Teaching children to trust their instincts is also a valuable lesson. Parents must listen when their child is showing they are fearful of a particular person or situation, rather than brushing it off. Kids are often more intuitive than we acknowledge. Supporting them in having this awareness can help them to identify dangerous people throughout their lives.”



Shelley Moench-Kelly, MBA, is a New England-based writer and editor whose freelance clients include Google, L’Oreal Paris and TheWeek.com.