Helping Bereaved Children Understand, Grieve and Deal with Death

Childrens varying per discussionalities and attitudes arrest their respective cognitive or psychological seeing of end, getion of grief, and head appliance. For the purpose of ascertaining these three st suppurates that bereaved children undergo, this paper identified and discussed the different perceptions of children nearly much(prenominal)(prenominal) loss, their valet de chambreifestations of sorrow and how pargonnts, teachers and counselors potty help. The specific situational mannequins and experiences of bereaved children were presented in lay to charter a cle arr and give commensurate picture of how such tragic casing affects the lives of helpless insofar unpretentious children.Helping Bereaved Children Understand, Grieve and Deal with finale Accepting the death of a go to sleepd one is difficult yet telling, explaining and making a child take in the loss is a more(prenominal) challenging task. Just as the adults or parents of the children are dealing with their possess grief, it is get the pictured that the younger ones should be spared from the a want(p) agony. This is for the reason that children, with their fragile minds and emotions, govern it more difficult to cope with death. However, not allowing a child to render, mourn and cope with the trauma of death is risky.Children should be supported and not be left alone when they deal with death. It is during their search for answers about a woolly-headed life that children most need the help of new(prenominal)s. It is also during this prison term that they should be allowed to express their emotions and be reassured by the family that death is a instinctive aspect of life. Children ordain be inevitably affected by a death of a family member, friend, or someone within the community. Childrens pitcher age, psychological understanding, emotional expressions, and coping mechanisms can be protected by love from hatful around them.Children, generally, have the distinct trait of holding jeopardize their true feelings, while some of them are more open to express their emotions. However, adults must take note that irrespective of this positive or prejudicious tonicity, children who suffer charge more profoundly also need to understand and cope with death. Childrens Cognitive Understanding of Death Death is a very hard experience for the younger ones to accept or realize. According to Doka (2000), children drive with a mixture of thoughts such as inevitability, universality, nonfunctionality, and irreversibility of death. Following the death, children would still be dealing with apprehending what their immature minds can only think and handle. They pass through with(predicate) the stages of cognitive, spiritual, emotional and social ripening (Doka, 2000). Doka (2000) explained that younger children are inclined to perceive death based on their own limited view. Thereafter, growing children tend to show sympathy. It is also during this stage that the y are more capable of accept and understanding the situation and collect themselves. However, Doka (2000) noted that younger children manifest a short feeling span. This is because they can prolong their intense emotions only for a limited period (Doka, 2000). Fighting with death is not only curb to children who are in risk of infectionous circumstances or to those who are psychologically or emotionally unstable. Nowadays, it is a proven fact that majority of children have directly or indirectly experienced death or death-related events even at their early lives. An article from the Encyclopedia of Death and Dying verbalise that curiosity regarding death is a portion of childrens average peak of development and search for information about the world.The same article specified an example about a dead fish floating in the water. This scenario can grab a childs interest but at the same time can be a troubling experience. If analyzed, the childs inquisitive instinct automatically d esires to learn more. However, the same child is likewise conscious of the possible danger of the situation. That is, if a living animal can die then other living things such as humans can also die. Childrens ikon to death is usually not only attached with some degree of anxiousness but also of elation.This is because of the idea that the discovery of something sensitive such as death has existingly led them to lifes many mysteries (Children and Adolescents Understanding of Death, 2007). The same article proved that thither are a lot of substantiate studies of death consciousness among children. The article used cases involving a father and son as an example to show that even with a child as young as sixteen-month-old can be aware about the creation of death. The childs awareness about death came as soon as he saw that the caterpillar, which he has been admiring, was crushed by a passerby.The toddler apprehensively reacted about the death and eventually refused to return to the place. After less than deuce years of being born unto this world, the same child can already and clearly connect life with death (Children and Adolescents Understanding of Death, 2007). With an early grounding to education, preschool children are inclined to view death as just impermanent and correctable. Crenshaw (1999) said that children believe that their deceased loved ones are just someplace and it is still possible to see or speak with them.Confusion sets in among preschool children particularly regarding the details of death. This is because of the childrens innate nature of thinking about things in an diminutive or factual manner. Crenshaw (1999) added that children ask questions such as can a dead person still breathe even if buried in a coffin and how can a dead old man who is buried be with God in a place like heaven at the same time. These queries manifest the preschoolers difficulty in relating intangible philosophical and religious ideas into their very limited re alization of death (Crenshaw, 1999).Younger grade-school children amidst the age of six and eight usually perceive death in a personalized and imputable manner that oftentimes connotes tending (Crenshaw, 1999). Their fear is reflected in the things they imagine or invent, such as when they imagine that a dreadful ghost in a skeleton costume is following(a) them. Childrens fear of death causes them to protect themselves. They use a defense mechanism that death is limited and only happens to physically weak people, the elderly, lame people, and people who are slow in running and are unable to break off the ghost or spirit that hunts them (Crenshaw, 1999).During this stage, children dream a lot of such frightening depictions of death. As they get older by the year, they reach a meaningful mark in their psychological growth that allows them to realize and accept that death is a true happening of life (Crenshaw, 1999). At age nine, they start to acknowledge death as a normal occupa tion that happens to all living things and that it is permanent and unavoidable (Crenshaw, 1999). Crenshaw (1999) noted that this is the start of such realization of death but it is until children reach their adolescence that they are able to alter this understanding.The National Association of School Psychologists or NASP (2001) affirmed the Crenshaw report and declared that children pass through developmental stages in understanding death. It is initially significant to acknowledge that every child has his or her distinct understanding of death. This cognitive ability is based on a childs developmental degree, psychological ability, quality or attribute, spiritual inclination, acquired instruction from parents and others around, information from the media, and death-related events in the past.The association, however, said that there are general circumstances that can be used to understand how children feel and cope with death. These considerations are seen during the stages from being infants and toddlers, preschoolers, early elementary school, eye school and high school (NASP, 2001, p. 2). NASP (2001) further explained that when someone is dead, infants and toddlers observe that adults are in sorrow yet they do not actually understand what death is and its impact and importance for them.Young children in preschool manifest denial of death by perceiving it only as a temporary breakup and a reversible situation. Nevertheless, children between five to nine years old capture to understand that death is permanent. They also recognize that some events may caterpillar track to death (NASP, 2001). Preschoolers and even early grade-schoolers connect the causes of death with some occult arts imaginations and real life events such as the September 11 barrage of the World Trade Center (NASP, 2001).Because of the 9/11 tragedy, they are able to grasp the idea that if an airplane hits a building, its passengers and those in the building will possibly die. Thus, thes e children envision that being in tall facilities is fatally dangerous. It is during this stage, however, that children are unable to draw the difference between what they visually see and the actual happenings around them (NASP, 2001). Moreover, they view that death occurs to others, not to themselves or even their neighboring(a) family members (NASP, 2001).