Monday, September 29, 2008

Sunny Day, Keepin' Al Qaeada Away!

It turns out that the Department of Homeland Security is worried that children won't know what to do in an emergency such as a terrorist attack or natural disaster. So how to teach kids without traumatizing them? Using the beloved characters from Sesame Street!

You can download everything you need at the Ready Kids website and even watch the videos.

I haven't watched it yet, but look forward to the inevitable new characters such as Sammy Suicide Bomber, Hannah Hurricane, Tommy Tornado, Evan Earthquake, and Brian Bird Flu.

5 comments:

kkdither said...

I was really hoping to connect up with a page from The Onion on this one....

We have lost all our marbles... While it is good to arm children with basic info such as: police can help them, what to do if they get lost, etc., this has the potential to scare children needlessly. It doesn't matter that it is coming from "Grover." In fact, that may make it worse.

As a parent, I felt it was necessary to give my children pertinent information. I was careful to deliver the "stranger danger" talk in a manner that wasn't frightening.

While we do live in a different world today, I don't think preparing children for ALL that could happen, just in case, is a good idea. It is just too much and all children develop at different emotional levels.

OrbsCorbs said...

I really don't know what to say about this. I don't have kids. I suspect that McDonalds is paying PBS/Sesame Street millions of dollars to broadcast subliminal messages, anyway.

hale-bopp said...

Next week's episode: How to turn in your friends and family for un-American activities!

OrbsCorbs said...

That's a rerun of a show from the 50's.

When I was a kid, we had those drills where we crouched under our school desks in case of nuclear attack.

Look how great we turned out.

kkdither said...

We crawled under our desks too for those drills. I also remember an anti-drug unit we had in 5th grade... a pre-DARE program.

Part of the curriculum was to teach kids to turn in their parents for drug use.... Even though I was only 10 years old, I knew that wasn't right.