Source: FEMA
September is National Preparedness Month. Each week, National Preparedness Month will highlight easy-to-follow steps that your family can take to improve preparedness at home. This week, the theme is “Teach Youth About Preparedness.”
Disasters affect everyone, and it’s important to include our children in preparing for emergencies, including COVID-19. According to research published by FEMA’s Individual Community Preparedness Division, youth can be an important part of building a national culture of preparedness; children under the age of 18 make up nearly one-quarter of the entire U.S. population.
These are some ways to teach children and youth about preparedness:
- Talk with young people about the types of disasters that can happen where you live.
- Learn how the entire family can be protected from COVID-19. Visit: Ready.gov/Pandemic. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) also has information about Talking with Children about Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
- Youth and children can learn about disasters through “Prepare with Pedro Disaster Preparedness Activity Book” and “Ready 2 Help.”
- Include all members of the family- children, youth, adults and seniors- in learning how to Get Tech Ready.
- Promote good financial saving practices by providing clear steps to saving, budgeting and setting and meeting financial goals. Encourage children and youth to start building good money habits. Saving a little bit at a time helps them learn the importance of preparing for all kinds of emergencies. Our partners at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau has additional resources online to teach youth financial capability.
Teach youth what to do when a disaster happens when they aren’t home, or when they aren’t with you, so they feel prepared, not scared. Ready.gov/Kids has educational tools and information to teach youth about disaster and emergency preparedness.
Public service announcements (PSA) made for television and radio are now available to download from the Ad Council website. These PSA help to spread awareness and prepare everyone for disasters.
