What to Do When the News Scares You: A Kid's Guide to Understanding Current Events

by Jacqueline B. Toner, Janet McDonnell (Illustrator)

Overview

Whether from television news reports, the car radio, digital media, or adult discussions, children are often bombarded with unsettling information about the world around them.

When the events being described include violence, extreme weather events, a disease outbreak, or discussions of more dispersed threats such as climate change or terrorism, children can get frightened and overwhelmed just like adults. This updated edition in the bestselling What-to-Do series can help. What-to-Do Guides for Kids are interactive self-help books designed to guide kids using-cognitive-behavioral techniques most often used in the treatment of various psychological concerns. Engaging, encouraging, and easy to follow, these books educate, motivate, and empower children to work towards change.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781433845239
Publisher:	American Psychological Association
Publication date:	01/07/2025
Series:	What to Do Guides for Kids Series
Edition description:	Revised, Revised Edition
Pages:	80
Product dimensions:	8.00(w) x 10.00(h) x (d)
Age Range:	7 - 10 Years

About the Author

Jacqueline B. Toner, PhD, is a clinical psychologist, having earned her PhD from the University of Virginia and served as Chief Facilitator for a medical resources project with Johns Hopkins School of Public Health and Carnegie Mellon University.

Janet McDonnell's illustrations combine traditional media and digital techniques. In addition to illustrating books, magazines, and puzzles, Janet has both taught and written for children from preschool to high school ages.

Table of Contents

Extensive note to parents and caregivers
Chapter 1. Sometimes scary things happen. 
Chapter 2. What is news? 
Chapter 3. Things that make the news more scary
Chapter 4. Did you see that!
Chapter 5.  Keeping it real
Chapter 6.  Un-news
Chapter 7. Taking care of you.
Chapter 8. Plan of action
Chapter 9. You Can Do It!
 

Editorial Reviews

★ 11/01/2021

Gr 2–4—This very timely book should prove enormously helpful to parents, teachers, librarians, and especially children. Designed to be shared between a trusted adult and a child, the book deals with topics like identifying and investigating scary news to figure out what's happening, understanding different types of news, understanding how reporters make news sound more exciting, identifying viewpoints offered, determining the reliability of sources, and asking questions to make sure your ideas are accurate. There are many interactive activities offered and spaces in the book for readers to draw and write. These drawings could serve as the basis of conversations. There are even activities that deal with "un-news," the ordinary things happening all around us that are comforting to recognize. The book's short chapters have titles such as "What is News?", "What's the Viewpoint?", and "What's Your Source?" The author, an experienced clinical psychologist, provides many activities and strategies that will help children feel safe and secure. The black-and-white illustrations include diverse family settings that highlight conversations between children and parents, as well as images that highlight news reporters on the job. In these times of climate change, infectious diseases, and political unrest, a book that focuses on helping children deal with their thoughts and feelings about news is welcome and much needed. VERDICT Though purchasing books with fill-in sections isn't the norm for libraries, this work's content and usefulness proves the exception to the rule.—Myra Zarnowski, City Univ. of New York

School Library Journal

2021-07-27
Short, interactive lessons about media tactics and source reliability are interspersed with exercises to help kids cope with the strong emotions that can accompany exposure to “scary news.”

Ten short chapters are preceded by a note to caregivers, clarifying that using the book requires adult supervision and that the intended audience does not include children who “have themselves experienced trauma or loss.” That sensible caveat makes more palatable the initial example of a White, middle-class nuclear family in which the children worry as Dad watches news simultaneously on TV and the internet, and Mom calls Grandma. The frequent black-and-white illustrations do offer varied representation in subsequent vignettes. Both the art and the conversational text imply readers under 10. From the start, the text acknowledges that frightening things do happen in the world and that news media use techniques to keep news “interesting”—which can also make things seem scarier. Children are invited to become investigators, with the book providing spaces for them to jot down observations each time they learn a new aspect of reporting, including camera angles, opinions versus facts, and the famous W questions. Climate change anxiety gets its rightful due, as do relaxation techniques. Violent, systemic racism—recently forefronting scary news—is undermined by positive references to police. (This book was reviewed digitally.)

From knowledge comes power over emotions. (Nonfiction. 6-9)

Kirkus Reviews