Live Long and Prosper...

You Want Heroes? by Frosty Troy, Oklahoma Observer, July 10, 2012 (Subscription Required)

No other American bestows a finer gift than teaching – reaching out to the brilliant and the developmentally challenged, the gifted and the average. Teachers leave the world a little bit better than they found it, knowing if they have redeemed just one life, they have done God’s work. They are America’s unsung heroes.

'Good job, teach': Educators emerge as heroes in Okla. tragedy

One survivor told KFOR-TV about how he worked to rescue a teacher stuck beneath a car that landed in the front hallway of one of the schools.

“I don’t know what that lady’s name is, but she had three little kids underneath her. Good job, teach,” he said, breaking into tears.

Remarks by the President at Teacher of the Year Event, April 23, 2013.

These folks did not go into teaching for money. They certainly didn’t go into it because of the light hours and the easy work. They walk into the classroom every single day because they love doing what they do, because they're passionate about helping our children realize the best versions of themselves so that our country can become the best version of itself.

And I just want to say to all of them, I hope that in some small measure this award keeps them going. Because I never want our teachers to feel discouraged at a time of budget cuts, at a time when all too often problems in the schools are laid at the feet of teachers; where we expect them to do so much, and sometimes they get so little in return.

"One looks back with appreciation to the brilliant teachers, but with gratitude to those who touched our human feelings. The curriculum is so much necessary raw material, but warmth is the vital element for the growing plant and for the soul of the child." -- Carl Jung


"Families bring their children in bright and early because they want them to learn," she said, "not because they want them to be test dummies." -- Zipporiah Mills, Principal of PS 261, Brooklyn, NY, when discussing field testing questions for new tests.


"In a completely rational society, the best of us would be teachers and the rest of us would have to settle for something less." -- Lee Iacocca




"I am a fortunate person: My work is my hobby. I think that being a teacher is the highest calling in life. One is trying to convey knowledge—I draw no hard distinction between being a teacher and being a researcher—but, more importantly than this, one is trying to infuse young people with a sense of joy of learning. Not just for its own sake, but for the lifelong results. Overall, the aim is to show and convince the student of the true worth of being a human being. And this is a moral quest. Not in some soft-sided fashion, but in a real, meaningful way." -- Michael Ruse


"The late W. Edwards Deming, guru of Quality management, once declared, 'The most important things we need to manage can't be measured.' If that’s true of what we need to manage, it should be even more obvious that it’s true of what we need to teach." -- Alfie Kohn, Schooling Beyond Measure


"That hunger and malnutrition should persist in a land such as ours is embarrassing and intolerable.
Special Message to the Congress Recommending a Program to End Hunger in America" —- Richard Nixon, May 6, 1969


"Do not accept directives from or pay consulting fees to people who have never in their lives been shut up in a room with 28 seventh graders...Count how many times the phrase 'joy in learning' is used in any proposal to 'fix' any school..." -- Susan Ohanian, Washington Post, Feb. 11, 2003




“The ‘bad teacher’ narrative as a way of explaining what’s wrong with our school system gets really old,” Ms. Cavanagh said. “Our union has taken a stance that we will collaborate and compromise and that is shortsighted when the other side seems bent on destroying you.” -- Julie Cavanagh


"It’s hard to think of another field in which experience is considered a liability and those who know the least about the nuts and bolts of an enterprise are embraced as experts." -- Pedro Noguera and Michelle Fine in Teachers Aren't the Enemy


"If kids come to us from strong, healthy functioning families, it makes our job easier. If they do not come to us from strong, healthy, functioning families, it makes our job more important." -- Barbara Colorose

The Courage of Teachers

Once again teachers are being given credit for saving the lives of the children under their care. The stories coming from Moore, OK tell of teachers who shielded children from falling debris and sang songs with their students to keep them calm. One report told of a teacher who refused to become "hysterical in front of [her] kids" even though her leg was impaled by a table leg.

Like in Newtown, CN, the teachers in Moore, OK put their students first. Of course they did. Teachers love their students.

It's About Time...

...that someone publicly recognizes that teachers are entrusted with the lives of their students, despite being demonized by "reformers" and the press. In an excellent article titled Teachers: Heroes in a crisis–but otherwise under fire -- at least from a teacher's point of view -- Ned Resnikoff hit the nail on the head.

“You don’t go into teaching for the money,” Oklahoma Education Association president Linda Hampton told MSNBC Tuesday. ”You go into teaching because you care about the kids. You spend more of your waking hours as a teacher with those children than anyone does, and they become your children. And just like any parent, you’re going to protect them at all costs."

Yet the role of protector during the hours in which children are in their care sometimes seems to have been lost in the public debate about education. Rarely recognized as champions of their students, public educators are more often targets of small-government conservatives and education reformers. Teachers across the country have watched their profession chipped away by school closures, mass layoffs, budget cuts, and other measures. Pressure to deliver top test scores has led to backlashes in some areas of the country. And cheating scandals, in which some educators altered scores to help advance their schools or protect themselves, harmed the reputations of teachers nationwide just as many were struggling to keep their jobs.

Teachers are praised for their courage in a crisis, yet are accused of being union thugs, not caring about anything but their paychecks, and only going into teaching because of the time off in the summer. The number of bad teachers, according to some "reformers" or their mouthpieces, must be enormous. So they espouse unproven solutions such as evaluating teachers using student test scores, privatizing public education and removing teachers' job protections while ignoring the fact that struggling schools are struggling not because of "bad teachers" but because of the unresolved social conditions associated with poverty.

Yet we've seen over and over again that the first duty gladly accepted by teachers is to their students.

Selfishness

In stark contrast to the love that teachers exhibit for their students during a crisis...and every day...are those who are selfish enough to let nearly a fourth of our students struggle along while living in poverty...the second highest poverty rate among "wealthy" nations. While tax breaks get renewed for the wealthy, the selfish ones complain that we shouldn't provide health care for our citizens and that taxes are just a form of government theft. While the disparity gap between rich and poor increases, the selfish ones fight against jobs programs, choosing instead to let the wealth trickle down from above. While teachers put themselves in harms way to protect their students, the selfish ones fight against providing help in the form of federal relief for disaster victims.

It's the "I've got mine. Go get your own" attitude which only seems to disappear when there's a crisis...but not completely.

[NOTE: the following quote had incorrect casualty figures. The author's update is included in italics at the end.]

Pathetic Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn Says Cuts Must Be Made Before He’ll Support Tornado Relief

Before the final body count has even come in...a pathetic excuse for a human being, GOP Senator Tom Coburn, will apparently require offsets to spending before he votes in favor of disaster relief for the areas of Oklahoma devastated by tornadoes on Monday.

Yes, you’ve read that correctly. Even with 20 children confirmed dead, along with 31 others (as of 12:30 am CDT), and countless others with their lives destroyed, this sorry excuse for a human is already playing politics with the lives of Americans who are in desperate need of help.

...Updated death toll as of 4:30 pm CDT 5/21, the medical examiner’s office has said that earlier reports were erroneous. The current death toll stands at 24 confirmed, including 9 children.

The selfishness of some people is amazing.

[UPDATE: From Indiana Coalition for Public Education--Monroe County and South Central Indiana.
Teachers: Protective Saviors or Overpaid Babysitters--You Can't Have It Both Ways

It is not enough that we commend teachers for their heroism in the face of tragedy when they throw their bodies in front of bullets or flying debris from tornadoes. Those events are symbolic of what teachers do for our kids and our society every single day. The smaller acts of heroism: connecting to a hard-to-reach child and giving him a feeling of self-worth, helping a kid to find her passion, discovering what the special key is to how these children learn, these are just some of the ways that teachers change lives.]

I had decided that I was done posting stories about the school shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut...but as people process the events there are many thoughts which I believe are valuable to read.

It's unfortunate that this only seems to happen when there's a tragedy or disaster of some sort...mass killings like the ones in Newtown or Aurora...disasters like Katrina...or acts of war like the attacks on 9/11. The intensity of the experience gives people the unwelcomed opportunity to put themselves in another's shoes -- to empathize with others. We know that it can happen anywhere. We are fragile, emotional beings and some of our co-inhabitants on this planet, and sometimes the planet itself, remind us of that all too often.

For whatever reason, humans have always had trouble not killing each other. Has there ever been a time when someone somewhere wasn't at war with someone else? On the other side of that coin are the "helpers" as Fred Rogers called them.

When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." To this day, especially in times of "disaster," I remember my mother's words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world.

There are always helpers who spend their days and often risk their own lives for the sake of others.

Some "helpers" deal with the physical...like nurses, EMTs and doctors. Others deal with the societal...like firefighters, police officers and soldiers. Still others attend to the emotional like therapists, more nurses, and more doctors.

Often "helpers" in one area have to cross over to another. Teachers do that on a daily basis. While focusing on academic growth, teachers have to help students in emotional distress...and sometimes, they have to help them deal with life-threatening situations like the teachers at Sandy Hook did.

The first first responders: Teachers stand on the front lines every day

Those of us who have been calling out the misuse and overuse of tests and the wrong direction the so-called "reformers" are taking public education, have been saying for years that there's more to being an educator than getting kids to pass a test. We were reminded of that in stark, horrible, and terrifying terms last Friday.

Teachers perform acts of heroism daily while being insulted, dismissed and ignored by politicians, pundits and policy makers.

We need to remind ourselves why teachers do what they do, how they care for our children, how they are co-guarantors, along with parents, of our future. Far beyond instruction, fidelity to curriculum, Common Core State Standards and the like are the daily challenges of teaching children who come to school with a limitless supply of problems and struggles.

It is true that we teach because we want children to learn, grow and succeed in this tough world. But there is so much more that we do.

We dry tears.

We try to keep sleep-deprived students alert enough to keep their heads off their desks.

We hug and hold students who have experienced a death in the family, a drug overdose, the incarceration of a parent or sibling, a shooting in the neighborhood, physical or sexual abuse, the emotional trauma of their parents' separations and divorces, abandonment.

We comfort students who are pregnant or seriously ill.

We purchase and distribute clothes (including socks and underwear), books, food, even beds, so that our students will have one less worry to distract them from learning.

We hand out stickers, trinkets, candies and treats.

We break up fights, mediate conflicts and mentor curious and creative children.

Frequently, we are the first to recognize signs of mental illness.

Every day at school, we are the first first responders.

[emphasis added]



Remember the Children

I've said this before...Children are not a high priority in our nation. Our priorities are money, money, and money. We've mortgaged their future, damaged the environment they're going to have to live with, and now, those who are jockeying for power are using them as a pawn in a quest for control of the money spent on public education.

We have the highest child poverty rate among advanced nations in the world and we're taking away their already meager safety nets. We're squandering our greatest resource -- our children.

America’s children seem to be shortchanged on almost every issue we face as a society.

Not only are we failing to protect our children from deranged people wielding semi-automatic guns.

We’re not protecting them from poverty. The rate of child poverty keeps rising – even faster than the rate of adult poverty.

And we’re not protecting their health. Rates of child diabetes and asthma continue to climb.

Connecticut Shooting: Sandy Hook Elementary Teacher Kaitlin Roig Protected Her Students

Yes, Ms. Roig, it's ok to tell your students that you love them.

"She only spoke, she said, because she wants us to know this is a school of teachers who care so much about each other and their students..." -- Diane Sawyer

Gene Rosen, Newtown Resident, Took In 6 Children During Sandy Hook Shooting

This story really touched me...see the last sentence below.

Rosen said Sandy Hook had always been a place of joy for him. He taught his 8-year-old grandson to ride his bike in the school parking lot and took his 4-year-old granddaughter to use the swings.

"I thought today how life has changed, how that ground has been marred, how that school has been desecrated," he said.

He said it wasn't his training as a psychologist that helped him that day – it was being a grandparent.

Tragedy @ Sandy Hook Elementary: Educators Respond

Educators across the nation mourn the violent loss of life at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Connecticut. Together we reflect, pick up the pieces and console our students. We honor the teachers and staff who risked their lives, gave their lives and saved lives.

Opinion: Sandy Hook Shows Teachers' Enduring Values

Perhaps part of their legacy will be a societal re-examination of the significance of educators and a better appreciation for our sense of duty to our students and our profession. Across the country, our educators commit countless deeds of kindness and altruism for the good of their students, colleagues, schools and communities. They expect nothing in return but to know that they have made a difference.

In other countries, the respect afforded the teaching profession bolsters their societies and helps to sustain it in so many ways. We should find ways to emulate these values and perceptions. We can honor the memories of the deceased by honoring the teachers who perform their noble duties daily. We can collectively elevate the status of education in our society and better support our teachers, students and schools.

...To so many, the educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School demonstrate that the core values of education mirror the greatest ideals of humanity, and they are exemplars in this regard. They offer us hope, and reinforce our belief in the goodness of others and the power of education. In an era of accountability, standards, testing and data, they affirm that what ultimately matters most are the immeasurable lessons and the enduring relationships teachers cultivate with their students.

To the educators of Sandy Hook Elementary School, thank you for the powerful, inspiring example of dedication and compassion you have given us. You have made, and continue to make, a difference to so many. In the midst of this unfathomable loss and profound sorrow, you have buoyed our spirits and given us hope. Because of your passion, courage, sacrifice, and devotion, I am once again reassured to proudly declare to educators everywhere: Never again say, "I am just a teacher."

More voices reacting to the tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School.

[UPDATE:] Heroism In Newtown

...everyone of these people expected to die, and yet their first priority, indeed, their only priority, was to protect their students. Not one of them ran off and left their kids, not one of them did this because of it was in their contracts, because they had to get their kids to pass standardized tests, or because of union agreements.

We go into this profession not for the money or the glory, we go into it for the love of learning, for the love of teaching, and for the love of children. And understand this, too: Every single teacher in America would do the same thing. That is the true meaning of "No Child Left Behind."

President Obama’s full speech



America's Teachers: Heroes or Greedy Moochers at the Public Trough?

I could have posted the entire article here. It's that good...

Let’s just note that the heroic teachers who died while courageously trying to protect their kids at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, CT, and the others who survived but stayed to protect the kids, were all part of a school system where the employees are members of the American Federation of Teachers.

Let’s just let that sink in for a moment. Those teachers, who are routinely being accused by our politicians of being drones and selfish, incompetent money grubbers worried more about their pensions than about teaching our children (though most, even after 10 years, earn less than $55,000 a year for doing a very difficult job that involves at least 12-14 hours a day of work and prep time counting meetings with parents), stood their ground when confronted with a psychotic assailant armed with semi-automatic pistols and an automatic rifle, and protected their kids. The principal too, a veteran teacher herself, stood her ground, reportedly suicidally charging at the assailant along with the school’s psychologist in a doomed effort to tackle him and stop the carnage.

Shaken Sandy Hook teachers: 'In time, we're going to heal'

“We’re going to stick together and in time, we’re going to heal.”

Reflections from Readers, 14, Diane Ravitch's blog

Diane Ravitch has 40 (and counting) "reflections from readers" filling her blog.

People don’t usually think of teachers as first responders, but that is exactly what they are. Whether it is physical assault, social aggression, emotional trauma or cognitive battering, educators are there to protect and defend our nation’s children each day.

Teachers risked, lost their lives to protect Sandy Hook children

Two kindergarten teachers take care of their students.

You touch hearts every day.
You change lives every day.
Monday is no different.
The people who will have the biggest influence on how our country will heal and who will bear the biggest responsibly for making it whole again are sitting right in front of you.
They need you.
You are their teacher.
You know exactly what to do

Dichotomy

These two articles show the divide in America. The first one is a congressman who is suggesting that we keep automatic weapons in our classrooms. The second, a senator who is going to introduce an assault weapons ban first chance she gets. Interesting reads...

GOP Rep Suggests Teachers Should Be Armed With Assault Rifles

Senator Vows To Introduce New Assault Weapons Ban On The First Day Of Congress

I can't imagine any teacher in America, or the world for that matter, who hasn't spent some time in the past 48 hours thinking about what he or she would do if faced with a deadly attack on his or her students.

The story of Vicki Leigh Soto whether 100% accurate or not, is an indication that she, along with many of her colleagues at Sandy Hook, did whatever was humanly possible to protect the young lives under their care.

The loss of so many young lives is just the latest in a series of similar stories. Our reactions are predictable...anger, sadness, disbelief...and fear. It's a reality in our nation that those who are entrusted with the education of young children are -- and have always been -- entrusted with their safety as well....from the air raid drills I remember growing up with in Chicago during the Cold War, to storm and fire drills...to the current need for lockdowns and "red alerts."

Pundits, politicians, and the usual teacher-bashers are praising the acts of the teachers at Sandy Hook Elementary School. How long will it be, however, before teachers are again accused of being failures, of only being in it for the money, of only caring about their pocketbooks, of teaching only because "those who can't, teach?"

How long will it be before more contract rights are taken away from teachers, more public schools are closed because of the nation's failure to deal with poverty (and violence), and more public money is transferred to private schools or corporate charters?

At first...immediately after the attack on children, words failed. Now the words are starting to come out. The words of anger and of anguish. Here are just a few voices...

Let the Nurturers Nurture

In another room in that building, fellow first grade teacher Kaitlin Roig locked her little ones in a bathroom and pulled a bookshelf in front of the door. She told the children to be perfectly quiet. She told the children there were bad guys out there right then and that they needed to wait for the good guys.

“As their teacher, I’m their protector,” the teacher told Diane Sawyer.

“I told the kids I love them,” she said, “and I was so happy they were my students…I said anyone who believed in the power of prayer, we need to pray.” And she didn’t leave out the children who didn’t believe in prayer. She told them to think happy thoughts. Even in a time of extreme stress, her thoughts were on the individual needs of those children.

She said she wanted “I love you” to be one of the last things they heard, because she was sure they were all going to die.

As this teacher contemplated her own death, she didn’t think about what she needed. She thought about what those little ones needed.

Thank you, teachers

This is from a science blog. The authors generally focus on the conflict some people have between science and religion...and evolution topics. Speaking about teachers...

And for this they get to be one of the most denigrated groups of professionals in the United States, targeted every single [expletive deleted] year for one “reform” after another, vouchers from the fundies and charter schools from the liberals, forced by law to take every spark of individuality and interest out of their curricula and then blamed when their students lose interest, resented their pensions and their health care by people who then blame them when their kids turn out to be apathetic.

Once the media horror dies down about Soto and her co-workers’ sacrifices, I guarantee you this: public school grade school teachers will go right back to being the despised class. “Union thugs.” “With three-month vacations.” “Teaching kids their ABCs.” All the idiotic, ill-informed, right wing anti-intellectual myths will rev up again as if nothing had happened. And in the meantime the people the Fox pundits despise will go on teaching kids to read and do math and treat each other with respect.

In other words, it’s not really that much of a jump to imagine all the teachers I know instinctively taking a bullet to protect their kids. To a first approximation, every single one of them does the same thing every waking moment, giving up their lives by increment to give their students a chance at a better life.

Proud To Teach

Jerzy Jazzman reminds us that teachers put their lives on the line...not just in a wealthy Connecticut town, but across the country in many difficult situations. We all walk into our classrooms thinking about how to reach our students, not how to protect them from evil. But, in an emergency, the first thought of most teachers would be for the safety of their students.

Let me, instead, remind all of you a terrible truth:

The last adult who tried to protect the twenty (dear God, twenty...) beautiful children who died yesterday was their teacher.

Twenty sets of parents - maybe single parents, maybe couples, maybe step parents - twenty sets of parents literally put the lives of their children into the hands of a teacher. Those wonderful teachers literally died because they were will willing to take on the awesome responsibility of caring for and protecting twenty wonderful, precious, innocent lives during the time they were in school.

Michelle Rhee Never Misses an Opportunity To Exploit a Tragedy

How does saving a child's life fit in the VAM evaluation process?

Both these teachers are heroes in their own way. Both these teachers did something extraordinary that cannot be measured with a test, with a piece of paper, with an observation. They did something that none of us put in their situation have no idea what we would do.

If their acts (and I am not omitting any other acts of bravery yesterday, just only know of these two thus far), are the ultimate acts, the very definition of effective teachers, what then would have become of them if they were subject to VAM as whether or not they are effective.

Now, I do not know what the new evaluation system in Connecticut consists of. I can only speak for what is coming or might come in NYC. But what these teachers showed is what happens in schools all over the country in one way or another every day. Intangibles that are so subjective there is no way to measure.

For Rhee and her sycophants to call these teachers in Newtown colleagues is not only laughable, but it is worse. It is vulgar. One of the worst vulgarities I have ever seen. These teachers are career teachers, went into teaching to have a career, a lifetime of education children. Rhee and her ilk stand for everything that is opposite of these two teachers belief systems.

A Land Without Guns: How Japan Has Virtually Eliminated Shooting Deaths

This article came out after the shooting in Aurora, Colorado -- July 23, 2012. It's an interesting read. Will we ever reach the point where a dozen shooting deaths in a year is too many for the entire country?

America's gun control laws are the loosest in the developed world and its rate of gun-related homicide is the highest. Of the world's 23 "rich" countries, the U.S. gun-related murder rate is almost 20 times that of the other 22. With almost one privately owned firearm per person, America's ownership rate is the highest in the world; tribal-conflict-torn Yemen is ranked second, with a rate about half of America's.

But what about the country at the other end of the spectrum? What is the role of guns in Japan, the developed world's least firearm-filled nation and perhaps its strictest controller? In 2008, the U.S. had over 12 thousand firearm-related homicides. All of Japan experienced only 11, fewer than were killed at the Aurora shooting alone. And that was a big year: 2006 saw an astounding two, and when that number jumped to 22 in 2007, it became a national scandal. By comparison, also in 2008, 587 Americans were killed just by guns that had discharged accidentally.

Almost no one in Japan owns a gun. Most kinds are illegal, with onerous restrictions on buying and maintaining the few that are allowed. Even the country's infamous, mafia-like Yakuza tend to forgo guns; the few exceptions tend to become big national news stories.

Guns Don't Kill People--Crazy People with Guns Kill People

Read this for an idea of how powerful the gun lobby is in America. We have restrictions for toys and ladders, but not for guns.

Children ages 5 to 14 in America are 13 times as likely to be murdered with guns as children in other industrialized countries, according to David Hemenway, a public health specialist at Harvard who has written an excellent book on gun violence.

So let’s treat firearms rationally as the center of a public health crisis that claims one life every 20 minutes. The United States realistically isn’t going to ban guns, but we can take steps to reduce the carnage.

American schoolchildren are protected by building codes that govern stairways and windows. School buses must meet safety standards, and the bus drivers have to pass tests. Cafeteria food is regulated for safety. The only things we seem lax about are the things most likely to kill.

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration has five pages of regulations about ladders, while federal authorities shrug at serious curbs on firearms. Ladders kill around 300 Americans a year, and guns 30,000.

We even regulate toy guns, by requiring orange tips — but lawmakers don’t have the gumption to stand up to National Rifle Association extremists and regulate real guns as carefully as we do toys. What do we make of the contrast between heroic teachers who stand up to a gunman and craven, feckless politicians who won’t stand up to the N.R.A.?

As one of my Facebook followers wrote after I posted about the shooting, “It is more difficult to adopt a pet than it is to buy a gun.”

Fischer Explains God’s Inaction

It was only a matter of time before someone said that God didn't protect those children because we "took God out of schools in 1962." One question in response, why did 4 little girls die in the bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham in 1963? Did someone "take God" out of the church?

Those people who use religion in this way are the lowest of the low...stupid, hateful, ignorant people.

And I’m so tired of this “God isn’t allowed in schools” nonsense. Kids pray in school every day and no one stops them. They pray individually and in groups. They gather around the flagpole and pray. There are literally thousands of Christian student groups at public schools all over the nation. They meet for Bible study and prayer sessions before and after school in classrooms and elsewhere on public school campuses. The only thing that can’t be done is the government cannot force a student to pray or read the Bible or be forced to listen to someone else pray.

Snopes: Newtown Rumors

As is typically the case in the wake of tragedy, many rumors began to swirl after the 14 December 2012 shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, which left 26 victims dead at that school. We'll try to keep up with some of the more widely-circulated ones...

Thank you Fred.

"When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." To this day, especially in times of "disaster," I remember my mother's words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world." -- Fred Rogers

Here are some resources for parents, school personnel and community members to access in times of crisis.

"When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, "Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping." To this day, especially in times of "disaster," I remember my mother's words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers – so many caring people in this world." -- Fred Rogers

The Best Resources On Talking With Children About Tragedies
More Advice On Dealing With Tragedies

Two lists of resources from Larry Ferlazzo.

National Association of School Psychologists

Information to help everyone cope. Helping Children Cope, Helping Children with Special Needs Cope

Click the image below to download the NEA Health Information Network School Crisis Guide.