As any parent knows, a kid’s energy and enthusiasm often drop exponentially between the end of the school day and early evening. And sometimes, those family dinner conversations that follow become painful rounds of questions followed by one-word answers. “How was school?” “Fine.” “Do you have much homework?” “Yeah.” “Any plans this weekend?” “Maybe.”
But for our family, Wednesday’s dinner was different. “Did you hear about Charlie Kirk?” my 17-year-old stepdaughter asked, referring to the assassination of the 31-year-old political pundit and founder of Turning Point USA. She said she’d liked watching clips of debates Kirk had with college students, describing him as a major reason why more young people have been turning toward the Republican Party.
I had heard, I told her, stopping to describe an interview I hadn’t thought about in years until a few hours earlier. In 2013, a seeming lifetime ago. I was working as the Daily Herald’s political editor. I became interested in Kirk, a Wheeling High School graduate and Harper College student who had the distinctive mark of somebody who was going places. He and local tea party activist William Montgomery met me in the newsroom one afternoon for a wide-ranging interview.
So, Wednesday night, I pulled up that piece, recalling his baby face and slightly too-big taupe blazer, his ease and confidence then of someone much older than 19 years of age.
My stepdaughter and I talked about that day’s shooting at Utah Valley University, as I nervously eyed her 6-year-old sister, who was poking at the kale chips left on her plate. How much of this was she hearing and internalizing? A few weeks back, on her first day of first grade, I’d made the internal compromise to watch news coverage of the shooting at Annunciation Catholic School in Minneapolis with the sound off as I was preparing dinner. A few days before that, I’d used hand motions to describe the false active shooter report at Villanova University, my own alma mater, and a school we’d recently gone on a college tour of.
The National Association of School Psychologists (NASP) suggests that high-profile acts of violence, particularly in schools, “can confuse and frighten children and youth who may feel in danger or worry that their friends or loved ones are at risk. They will look to adults for information and guidance on how to react.” The organization notes that caregivers and school personnel “have a responsibility to help children and youth feel safe by establishing a sense of normalcy and security, reinforcing their natural resilience, and talking with them about their fears.”
However, it’s vital that these conversations be developmentally appropriate — with NASP noting that early elementary school-aged children need “brief, simple information that should be balanced with reassurances that their school and homes are safe and that adults are there to protect them.” Upper elementary and middle school students, meanwhile, may need help separating reality from fantasy, while high school students “are more likely to have strong and varying opinions about the causes of violence in schools and society.”
A longtime reporter and a believer in the truth and communal value of the news, I also carry with me the conflicting gut instinct to shield my kids from as much of this horrible, uncertain reality as possible.
Both of my girls likely have no idea who Fred Rogers of “Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood” was, his ubiquitous cardigan and way of explaining things, simply and effectively, to children.
Nearly 60 years ago, the ordained minister with degrees in theology and child development aired a special episode to help address children’s questions and fears following the 1968 assassination of Robert F. Kennedy.
In that June 1968 episode, Rogers, the voice of puppet Daniel Tiger, asks Lady Aberlin, “What does assassination mean?”
“Have you heard that word a lot today?” Lady Aberlin responds.
“Yes,” Daniel replies. “And I didn’t know what it meant.”
“Well,” Lady Aberlin says, “it means somebody getting killed, in sort of a surprise way.”
The scene then pivots to Rogers, who pleads with the audience for the “protection and support of our young children. There is just so much that a very young child can take,” he says.
I don’t have the power or grace of Rogers. But in this horrible reality, I know I need to work on it. In the meantime, I am reminding myself to be thankful for the normalcy of the days I struggle through a meal of one-word answers.
Kerry Lester Kasper is a Chicago-based writer.
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