Thursday, June 27, 2013

10 Tips to Keep Your Kids Safe

I was given a copy of Safe Kids, Smart Parents: What Parents Need to Know to Keep Their Kids Safe to review.

There are times that every parents fears something bad happening to their kids; everything from falling down and getting hurt, being bullied or the often unimaginable being molested or kidnapped.  With the constant news and media it is easy to start to live in a world of fear.

Rebecca Bailey PhD and Elizabeth Bailey RN, take on this topic in their book Safe Kids Smart Parents: What Parents Need to Know to Keep Their Kids Safe.

Here are their
10 Tips For Keeping Kids Safe

1. Share Age Appropriate Information- Keep it Simple!

2. Set Ground Rules and Clear Boundaries

3. Teach Kids to be aware of their surroundings

4. Show them you love them- love equals strength

5. Teach kids to assess surroundings using Safety Equation

6. Promote Good Self Esteem and Self Worth

7. Establish rules for social media sites and keep computer in common room

8. Create a "safe-list" of trusted friends and family members

9. Know Yourself- what messages are you sending to your kids

10. Don't be afraid- encourage discussion to empower with knowledge

In the book it says, "safety is about teaching kids to be aware of their environment and how to make safe and appropriate choices throughout the day."

The book has a huge emphasis on communication and about the need to communicate at an age appropriate level with our kids.  There are sample conversations and scenarios broken down into age groups that I plan on having with my kids.  These samples really make it quite simple and very easily doable.  There are even chapters as the end of the book just for kids that either your child can read or you can read to them, depending on their age.

The Bailey sisters use their education, work experience and life experience to help educated parents on how to keep their kids safe.  The chapters flow quickly and keep your intrigued with real life scenarios throughout.   As a psychology major myself, I appreciated how they took well known principles and shared them in a way that any and every parent can apply.

I will admit, books like this I often half skim or quickly lose interest in, but I found myself with a pencil in hand marking things throughout the whole book.  I also know I will be coming back and using the different age sections as my kids get older.

I strongly recommend this book for any parent.

This book is available in print or as an e-book at the following locations.


The best part, I have been authorized to give one of you a copy of this book (don't worry a new one provided by the publisher, not the one I marked up).

The giveaway will be open until July 9th.


Disclaimer: I was provided a copy of the book to review and the publisher will provide one of my readers a copy also.  All opinions are my own and truthful.

10 comments:

  1. Whenever I leave my kids somewhere (school or church or camp), we always talk about who would be allowed to pick them up and how they wouldn't be allowed to leave with any one else, no matter what that person is saying.

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  2. Sounds like a great book!

    I've had to share more than I wanted with my kids about being safe when a 10 year old girl went missing here in Denver last year. Instead of fire drills....we have lock down drills at school.

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  3. Sounds like an awesome book!! Will share to my mommy friends!

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  4. I've definitely started to! The other day Alea went to go pet a dog and I pulled her arm back and explained that she needed to ask the owner before she ever pet a dog and to never pet a dog without an adult's permission. She seemed to understand, it's just hard to know for sure what she understands at 3.

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  5. Sounds like a great gift to give to my married kids.

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  6. I really like #10. It's important to be honest with your children...not to scare them but for them to know that they need to be careful!

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  7. These are great tips and important tips. My daughter has her own phone now and it scares me - despite my hovering, it still scares me. I agree that setting and enforcing the boundaries are very important and that love gives them strength.

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  8. Great tips! Thanks so much for sharing!!

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  9. Teaching safety is sometimes a hard thing. It is so easy to forget things that we know but don't realize they haven't been taught that. This book sounds wonderful.

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  10. As parents we have to keep eyes open ears alert for the children saftey. Listen carefully when they want to speak to you about their day they might say something as a clue without knowing they told u what wasn't supposed to be repeated. Keep the children safe please.

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