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Using Children’s Literature to Help K-8 Students Understand and Cope With Disaster and Trauma
Unformatted Document Text:  A Classroom Prepared for Crises: Using Children’s Literature to Help K-8 Students Understand and Cope with Disaster and Trauma I was a teacher in a public school in Tennessee in September 2001. I was performing roll call duties on the morning of September 11 th when the news broke that the World Trade Center and the Pentagon had been attacked. I starkly recall how American citizens initially reacted with a collective sense of shock to the terrible events that transpired in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania as well as the national lull of numbness, sorrow and rage that followed. I also remember how those emotions were mirrored in our school and in my classroom. Within days of that initial reaction, my colleagues and I were confronted with the unsavory prospect of conducting our classes in an environment of great confusion and emotional anxiety. On a morning later that week, a news crew from a local television station even visited our school to interview teachers about student morale and teacher approaches to answering questions and meeting general needs. It was then that I began to see real world community expectations of teachers during such times of crisis. Frankly, I wish I had been better prepared. As I watched real-life dramas unfold during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita last summer, I was forced to revisit those days that followed September 11, 2001. I remembered how challenging it was for me then to do my job as a teacher and how some of these same challenges now face teachers across the United States. News reports and television images of the impacts of these hurricanes have left all Americans asking serious questions about our environment, our safety, the competence of those charged with our protection, and our attention to preparedness for future disasters. Compelling questions have also arisen within the field of education regarding the impact of natural disasters upon school children (Berson & Berson, 2001). What will be done to compensate for the great loss of school structure in the Gulf Coast and who will fund 1

Authors: Lovorn, Michael.
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A Classroom Prepared for Crises: Using Children’s Literature to Help K-8
Students Understand and Cope with Disaster and Trauma
I was a teacher in a public school in Tennessee in September 2001. I was
performing roll call duties on the morning of September 11
th
when the news broke that
the World Trade Center and the Pentagon had been attacked. I starkly recall how
American citizens initially reacted with a collective sense of shock to the terrible events
that transpired in New York, Washington and Pennsylvania as well as the national lull of
numbness, sorrow and rage that followed. I also remember how those emotions were
mirrored in our school and in my classroom. Within days of that initial reaction, my
colleagues and I were confronted with the unsavory prospect of conducting our classes in
an environment of great confusion and emotional anxiety. On a morning later that week,
a news crew from a local television station even visited our school to interview teachers
about student morale and teacher approaches to answering questions and meeting general
needs. It was then that I began to see real world community expectations of teachers
during such times of crisis. Frankly, I wish I had been better prepared.
As I watched real-life dramas unfold during Hurricanes Katrina and Rita last
summer, I was forced to revisit those days that followed September 11, 2001. I
remembered how challenging it was for me then to do my job as a teacher and how some
of these same challenges now face teachers across the United States. News reports and
television images of the impacts of these hurricanes have left all Americans asking
serious questions about our environment, our safety, the competence of those charged
with our protection, and our attention to preparedness for future disasters. Compelling
questions have also arisen within the field of education regarding the impact of natural
disasters upon school children (Berson & Berson, 2001). What will be done to
compensate for the great loss of school structure in the Gulf Coast and who will fund
1


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