Podcasts to Help You Talk with Your Kids About Charlottesville

Some conversation starters for your family this week.

If you’re like me, you struggle with how to talk with your kids about the rise and prominence of hate groups in the U.S. and around the world. It’s not that you shouldn’t talk with you kids about it, it’s about that you need to find a way to help them understand what they’re seeing, and help them manage their fear (while managing your own). And of course, most importantly, you have to provide an opportunity to ask questions.

I’ll be the first to admit I’m not always the best at this. That’s why I’m thankful for a couple of shows for kids that provide ways to open the doors to those conversations.

Science podcast But Why? put out a special episode about talking to your kids about violence in the news. This one came out after the shootings at Pulse in Orlando, Florida:

And Sparkle Stories has a number of stories to help kids understand accepting others. They put up a blog post with five shows, four stories and and an interview with a psychologist about bullying. You can find all of those episodes here.

And here’s an excerpt from the Sparkle Stories blog post, that provides good advice for how to use these episodes to spark conversation:

Start by letting your child listen — without any context or coaching.

Then later that day or the following day, your child may have a question. This is the cue that they are ready to process the story with you. At that point the lemurs or judges or gnomes can serve as a starting place for a conversation about something real in their life — or an enduring question they have had.

Sometimes listening to them again or a third time is good for some children — but the stories will be much more effective if they are NOT attached to a lesson or advice.