Helping Children Deal With Climate Change Fears – A Video With Robin Grille
How do our children feel when they hear, more and more, about the frightening effects of climate change? How can we help them to feel empowered and connected in the face of the increasing abundance of news on the subject?
Here is a short video I made, with the assistance of Nuria Lopez, full of practical suggestions – and even some reassurance for us!
Video Overview
Robin Grille is the author of Parenting for a Peaceful World and a psychotherapist in Australia. In the video above he helps parents to explore and discover insights into empowering themselves and children discussing climate change.
What is the difference between fear and trauma?
Fear is a natural response to a frightening event, but we settle down after the event. Trauma is when fear lingers long after a scary event.
Trauma = Fear + Helplessnes or Aloneness/Isolation
Intense fear is much more likely to resolve with some kind of action, our own action or with the help of another person. There is a lot we can do as just one person, and especially for our children.
Robin’s four step process in the video includes:
- Validating Our Children’s Emotions
- Offer Your Protection
- Empower Your Child To Act
- We Are Not Alone
Resources Listed In The Video
350.org – Building a Global Climate Change Movement, Climate-focused campaigns, projects and actions led from the bottom-up by people in 188 countries. Email is how 350 connects — Join in and get started:sumofus.org
avaaz.org – meaning “voice” in several European, Middle Eastern and Asian languages—launched in 2007 with a simple democratic mission: organize citizens of all nations to close the gap between the world we have and the world most people everywhere want.causes.com
getup.org.au – GetUp! is an independent movement to build a progressive Australia and bring participation back into our democracy. The US version is Move On.
More Resources
Read more on Parenting in a Age of Climate Change: Communicating Tough Truths to Children on Kindred
NASA’s Official Climate Kid’s Eyes On The Earth Website
Climate Change and Children Resource List from Pinterest
Children Are Suing Big Oil Over Climate Change – Article
A Student’s Guide to Global Climate Change: Educator Lesson Plans
EPA’s Educator Resources, Environmental Protection Agency
National Wildlife Federation’s Climate Change Curriculum Connections
Photo: Shutterstock/Sangoiri