What Your Children Should Know About Keeping Safe

From an early age it is important that you teach your children how to keep themselves safe. They need to understand what situations are dangerous and how they can go about avoiding them. They also need to learn to be wary of strangers. It is certainly not about frightening them but teaching them how to look out for their own safety. Sometimes accidents happen and unfortunately there are people who do intend on harming others. You can take steps towards protecting yourself and your family by putting in security doors and security screens in your home.

Strangers

It is important to teach your children about the potential danger that they may face from someone they don't know. They shouldn't be taught to fear everybody but they should know that they can't fully trust someone they have only just met. They should be taught to never open the front door to strangers, particularly if you are not home, and they should definitely not go with a stranger or get into the car of someone they don't know. They also need to be told not to accept anything from a stranger, such as food or drink. They should let you open the front door, unless you say it is ok, then they should still leave the security door shut and locked. A security door is useful because you can still see out and speak to the person, but with a lot of security doors they can't see in. If your children walk by themselves to and from school they need to understand that they need to be careful and always be aware of what is going on around them. They should know never to accept a lift from a stranger.

Fire

It is important for every family to have a fire safety plan and every one should know exactly what to do in case there is a fire. Children should be taught to get down low to the ground and crawl to safety. They need to know in advance where they should get out of the house and understand that the best way out might be through a window or a back door. They should know to feel the temperature of any doors before they go through it in case there is fire in the room on the other side. As a family you should work out where you will meet if anything like this happens.

Water safety

Unfortunately there are many cases of children drowning each year. Your children should be taught how to swim but also they need to learn how to keep safe when they are around water. There are many things that can go wrong at the beach or when swimming in rivers as there are a lot of unknown factors, like tides and rips at the beach and things hidden under the water in rivers, such as tree branches and rocks. Children should understand that diving into water that they don't know the depth of is extremely dangerous. It is important that they learn to swim between the flags at the beach.
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Sky Watch: New Day

Seeing beautiful sunrise is a nice way to welcome a new day. Here is one sunrise view that captured on the way to my grandfather’s house.Sky Watch Friday

How Soup Kitchens Help the Homeless

Homeless services such as soup kitchens are very important to the homeless community; in fact it is often the lifeline for these people. Over 100,000 people are homeless in Australia, and most of them need feeding. When thinking of the homeless, many people imagine the older men they see on the streets.

Beyond the Stereotype
While it is true that these men make up part of the homeless population, there are also many other people that are homeless but you may not actually see them on the streets. Only 1 in 7 people will sleep on the streets, meaning there are many people you do not see that have no place to call home. Some of them will be lucky enough to be able to stay with a family or friend, or perhaps they will secure a bed in a boarding house. Some of them will get a bed in the service system.

The sort of person who becomes homeless cannot be defined in one demographic. All types of people become homeless each year for a variety of reasons. The single largest cause of homelessness is actually domestic violence, so this means it is often women and children who are seeking shelter and food.

Homeless Children and Youth
There are over 10,000 children that are homeless right now, and one in forty children under the age of 5 will use a homeless service each year. Half of the 100,000 homeless are under 24-years old. So as you can see, the homeless community is a wide and varied one. It could be your friend, your neighbour or your family that ends up in this same position.

Services for the Homeless
A soup kitchen is a place where food is offered to the homeless for free or sometimes for a small, affordable price. Volunteers run the kitchens, often coming from church groups, by preparing and serving the meals. The food is usually provided by companies for free as charity, or at least at a reduced cost. Sometimes the volunteers will run a food drive to collect canned goods they can either serve or hand out to people and families who need them.

The kitchens are usually open daily, serving either lunch or dinner but rarely both. For the people that frequent these places, this may often be the only meal of the day for them. When soup kitchens started in the 18th Century they served just soup and bread. These days however, they serve a bigger variety of food. Casseroles, pastas and noodles are often found on the menu and even drinks such as fruit juice, tea and coffee are served. It is quite rare for fresh produce to be available at the kitchens if there is fruit being served it is usually from a tin.

There are many soup kitchens throughout Australia. Find one by contacting your local church or charity group to see if there are any near you. You may find there is one quite far away, which could mean you make a weekend or holiday out of it.
 
For example there is a soup kitchen at Inverell, so you could find Inverell accommodation and then help out in the kitchens the next day. It will make your next holiday feel more worthwhile.