Must Know Basic Safety Info For Your Family

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could keep our kids inside this bubble where we know they can never get themselves injured or hurt in any way?  Or even if we could make sure that we’ll always be by their side to protect them from all the dangers in the world.

Reality check…

It’s simply not possible.  Kids will be kids and your best bet is to teach them how to look out for their own safety and implement some strategies for handling different situations in and outside of the home.

Let’s cover some in home safety tips to consider:

1. This first one is an easy one but very challenging for young kids to adhere to.  Teach them to never open the door for anyone unless they have been instructed to do so.  We get it, when someone rings the door, they get super excited and automatically run to see who is there and we don’t want them opening the door to a potentially dangerous person
2. Have your kids memorize your phone numbers and their home address.  Once in awhile, have them repeat it so that it stays fresh in their minds
3. Teach them how and when to call 911.  Or if they can’t call, run to the neighbors house for help.  Run through some scenarios and have them tell you what they should do.
4. Have a list of emergency contact numbers
   1. Poison Control
   2. Close relatives
   3. Neighbors
   4. Trusted local parents
5. Have a smoke detector in every room.  Most new detectors these days will beep at you when the batteries are dying to alert you to change them out.
6. Have a carbon monoxide detector in living and bedroom spaces.  Carbon monoxide gas is colorless and odorless so without these in place, it will not be detected.
7. Cover your unused electrical outlets.  Even better is if you install the outlets with the safety features already built into it, that way you don’t need to worry about the kids prying them off or it getting taken out and misplaced.
8. Keep medicine and cleaning agents locked up or out of reach.
9. Talk to your kids about Internet Safety:
   1. Teach them never give out personal information to anyone online
   2. Put time restrictions on their usage
   3. Have computers be located anywhere but inside their room
   4. Track their history to see where they have visited
   5. Have regular discussions on what is appropriate and what is not for them to interact with
   6. Restrict which sites they can visit by setting this in the parental controls
10. Take some time out to discuss, map out and role play an emergency home evacuation plan
    1. Decide on a central location to meet outside of the house
    2. Practice what to do in case of a fire
       1. If they can evacuate, crawl or stay low to see under the smoke
       2. If they are trapped, stuff a towel under the door open a window and yell for help
       3. Do not hide in a closet or under the bed. Hiding makes it harder for the firefighters to find you in smoky conditions
       4. Use escape ladders if you have a multiple story house. There should be one in every bedroom. Make sure to familiarize yourself on how to use it.
11. Have emergency food and supplies on hand

Image by philipbase via Pixabay

Now let’s start with some outside of the home safety tips:

1. Theme park (or any crowded event) nightmare:  You lose your kid in the crowd! Teach them to stay calm, stay put and flag down someone who works there.  Emphasize with them that you will make your way back to find them and staying put will make that easier to do.

Or if you’re like a friend of mine who goes to Disneyland on a regular basis, before they start their day of adventures, they remind their kids of their special meeting spot (one for each park) to go to if any of them were to ever be separated.

2. When you’re out on vacation, don’t post pictures or videos on social media.  This will just create opportunities to have your home burglarized

3. Teach them to be aware of their surroundings at all times.  Know to look for cars coming. Know when it’s safe to cross the streets.  Teach them not to run in parking lots. And of course, constantly remind them not to talk or go with any strangers under any circumstances.

If you found any of this information to be helpful, please share with a fellow parent.

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