Training Curricula for Children & Youth

Ideally, all children/youth should receive training and education on issues of personal safety and abuse prevention. Personal safety and child sexual abuse prevention training should be age-appropriate to promote child/youth understanding of—and confidence in—your organization’s strategies to keep them safe. Both the Child Welfare Information Gateway and the National Sexual Violence Resource Center have resources available to help you select and evaluate available training programs.

If it’s within the scope of your responsibilities to provide training for children and youth, here are some best practices to incorporate as you build your curriculum:

Involve Parents

Most successful prevention programs actively engage parents.
Your curricula should include training materials for parents through information/education evenings, take-home papers, and take-home family exercise sheets.

Choose a Developmentally Sequenced Curriculum

Programs for younger students tend to be more rules-based: “If someone tries to touch you in an inappropriate way, say ‘No,’ get away, tell a grown-up.
Programs for older students contextualize the personal safety training within experiences appropriate to their developmental stage (being out of the house, being with groups, dating, babysitting, etc).

Let Research Guide Your Child Personal Safety Instruction

Programs are successful when they are based on the most current research in prevention education, which tells us that effective programs should:

Include rigorous evaluation
Begin as early as pre-Kindergarten
Use developmentally sequenced materials
Utilize active, systematic, and specific skills training
Have multiple program components such as classroom training combined with parental involvement
Use interactive instructional techniques that provide children multiple opportunities to observe the desired behavior
Model the behavior and get feedback
Be instituted as a comprehensive part of the child’s education, and repeated many times during the school year
Be instituted over several years of instruction

Ensure Your Child Personal Safety Curricula Include Critical Elements

An effective curriculum:

Includes skills building along with instruction
Strengthens children’s/youth’s self-confidence and self-esteem
Develops knowledge of basic safety skills
Distinguishes between appropriate and inappropriate touch
Instructs children/youth to be able to say “no” to unwanted overtures
Teaches children/youth self-protective skills
Encourages disclosure by instructing children and youth to always tell an adult about inappropriate or unwanted behaviors
Instructs children/youth how to identify the private parts of their bodies using correct anatomical terms, if appropriate for the community
Instructs children/youth how to identify an adult they can trust, as well as the importance of talking to an adult if something bothers them—and that some secrets need to be told
Instructs children/youth that adults sometimes act inappropriately
Emphasizes the fact that inappropriate adult behavior is never the fault of the child or youth
Teaches children/youth that victims can be people of any age, size, color, or sex
Teaches children/youth that touching problems can occur in adults of any age, size, color, or sex, and in either strangers or people they know
Teaches children/youth that other children/youth can sometimes be confused about what safe and unsafe touching are and can also have touching problems

Pay Attention to Presentation

An effectively presented child safety instruction program:

Is grounded in theory and research
Localizes the curriculum to fit specific community needs
Includes proper training for presenters, teachers, parents, and community officials
Respects the developmental abilities and limitations of children at various ages
Includes training for developmentally and physically challenged children
Incorporates demonstrations and rehearsal of desired behavior by each child
Occurs on multiple occasions over several years and includes periodic reviews
Includes supplemental sessions to reinforce skills
Is interactive
Includes homework
Includes comprehensive evaluation
Includes parental involvement
Provides complete and accurate information about sex to older children, if appropriate for the community

Emphasize Awareness

Ultimately, an effective training curriculum supports awareness of child sexual abuse as a prevention strategy, by:
Fostering improved communication between a parent and a child/youth about personal safety
Fostering in children/youth understanding about the importance of adult supervision in their safety
Requiring the proper reporting of all child sexual or physical abuse
Encouraging parental or community involvement
Promoting notification by responsible adults to the proper authorities of any perceived changes in a child’s behavior after instruction
Fostering the idea that children have the right to control what happens to their bodies and to protect themselves

More Resources

For more information on abuse prevention curricula for your organization, you can review these resources and reports that have been evaluated for effectiveness.