Parenting Guide - Building Your Child's Ability to Identify Stranger Danger

A good way to train your kid's skill at handling unknownWhat You Can Do
and strange situations is to practice "what if" scenesFirstly, you need to teach your kid to go with his
with them. This will help to prepare your kid when heinstincts. Most kids will have a relatively low level of
actually faces a potentially dangerous situation and canexperience with strangers. In such cases, it is better to
identify that he might be in danger. This training sessionplay safe and if a stranger is asking him or her to do
should be accompanied by the proper response andsomething which doesn't feel right even in the slightest
actions so that kids know exactly what to do in orderbit, your child should reject any help from that stranger
to get them out of trouble. At a young age, basicand be sure to stay in an area with good human
street smarts can be taught to children and will provetraffic where he can call out for help should the
invaluable at that age.stranger persist.
We can't control what our children do every minute.You also need to constantly point out authority figures
But we can help them think with proper parentingat a shopping mall or even out in the streets so that
guide, early in their lives, about what is and what is notyour child knows that help from such people are
safe, so we can trust them to take responsibility forperfectly safe and that he should be looking out for
their actions and to make safe decisions now and asthem if he's alone, be it lost at a shopping mall or
they mature.waiting outside the school. With parenting skill, parents
Stranger Dangercan easily administer appropriate parenting solutions.
It is hard to have kids follow the age of teaching ofYou should also role-play some common scenarios
"don't talk to strangers". It is important to take note thatthat strangers may utilize to trick your child into
they need to also understand that not all strangers arefollowing him or doing something that will put him in
bad people. If they get lost out in a shopping mall, mostdanger. Simple exercises like this will kick in and
of the people they encounter will be able to help thembecome very helpful in getting your child prepared for
and give them help. The tricky part is how to separatesuch scenarios. In the event a stranger approaches
a stranger that is offering help to them against oneyour kid, at least he's not being confused as to what's
who has a less than good motive.happening and he knows exactly how to react.