Why a Boston Teachers College Is Sending Its Students to Northern Ireland to Learn About a Child Trauma Program That Could Help U.S. Kids, Too [the74million.org]

When two bombs went off at the Boston Marathon finish line in 2013, children in the city were paying attention. In day cares and schools, youngsters told their teachers they couldn’t go to the city anymore because of the bad people there, and that they couldn’t run races because they would get hurt.

But a group of Boston student-teachers was prepared to respond to just these types of fears among young children. They attended Wheelock College, a teacher training school in the city, and had just returned from Belfast, where they were learning about an early childhood curriculum created to help Northern Ireland’s youngest generation heal from the region’s 30-year sectarian conflict, known as the Troubles.

So Wheelock students put their training to work. They let the children know they were listening. They asked how the students were feeling. They answered questions but didn’t tell the young children every detail about the bombing. Most importantly, they told stories about all the people who were keeping them safe.

[For more on this story by KATE STRINGER, go to https://www.the74million.org/a...d-help-u-s-kids-too/]