[Editor’s note: This is a 6-part series regarding my views and plenty of common sense on how to keep your children safe in a dangerous world. It is generally geared toward children 12 and under. I hope it helps you.]
Thus far we’ve covered how to keep your children safe in public, at home, in school, from strangers, and online. What could be left? Well, here’s a few more things to consider…
Car Safety
Certainly our kids spend a lot of time in the car and, for the most part, have no control over what goes on because they’re the passengers. That said, the obvious things we can and should teach our children is that they should be properly buckled up, in appropriate cars seats, and not to sit up front until it’s safer (because of air bags). Occasionally I see people who allow their children to roam the car freely in the car, which boggles my mind for a number of reasons. Granted, we didn’t have such seat belt laws when I was a kid and did the same thing but, hey, times are different.
I know my kids are very good about buckling up (though I always ask anyway) but on occasion I’ve found them unbuckled for some unknown reason, especially on long car rides. Likewise, I’ve caught them not utilizing their seat belts properly, such as moving the shoulder belt behind them so they are effectively only wearing a lap belt. Again, these are good times to remind them why they wear their seat belts and should do so properly. Right now my youngest is 7 and is itching to get out of his car seat (he can get out at 8) but we persist because those are “the rules.”
Friends
The last area I want to touch upon are friends. In my opinion, this is the most “dangerous” category of them all. Anybody that has been a young boy or has them–I assume girls can be included here too but I don’t have that experience–can fully understand how much influence peer pressure has on children, especially as they become teenagers. My oldest is still only 10 but I can already see how important and all-consuming his friends are becoming… and it’s only going to get worse.
I’m sure I was the same way but it’s different when the shoe is on the other foot and now I have to worry about what my children might be up to when I’m not around. Fortunately, we’ve been really blessed with the vast majority of their close friends. In particular, the family next door has wonderful children who happen to be our childrens’ best friends and they get along marvelously. There is one new influence, however, in my oldest child’s life that I’m not too thrilled with and who happens to be a school friend. Long story short, we’ve had a few talks about what we expect his behavior to be and have severely limited their ability to get together outside of school. In fact, the post from this Wednesday regarding “online” safety came into play because my child was “face timing” his buddy (something you can do via iPods) which has been put to an end because they were having potentially inappropriate conversations.
Now, can I control that at school? Of course not. The best I can do is to continually re-iterate what I expect and hope that it eventually sinks in. I guess my point here is to (1) pay attention to who your children really hang out with and (2) nip problems in the bud early on.
Certainly, there are plenty of positive influences, you just have to put your children in the position to foster them. Activities like sports could be one area while church and church-related activities could be another great one. Ultimately, I know I won’t be able to control exactly what my children do at all moments, neither can I control who they hang out with, in particular as they get older. The best I can do is to set my expectations and hope something sank in… and then make their live miserable if they do something really dumb. 😉
If you have your own suggestions feel free to share them below…
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