Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/early-childhood-professionals-partners-with-parents-helping-young-children-exposed-to-violence/5010239/
The teacher of the four and five year olds saw beauty in unusual things. Prior to Christmas, she found a dead, but to her eyes, beautiful tree branch. She painted it white and brought it to church as a special Christmas wish tree for her class.After setting it up and having the class decorate paper ornaments, she sat down to write each child's holiday wish as they told them to her. The wishes for bicycles, dolls, and toys were not forthcoming; instead, each child wished for an end to violence. Some wished that the killings would stop, others that people wouldn't steal, still others wished for an end to angry, hate-filled words.
What she and their parents came to realize was that the children had been deeply affected by a violent incident at the church weeks before - an armed rob-bery in the church parking lot on an October Sunday morning. Some of the children actually encountered the armed young men demanding money, jewelry, and cars; some had been hidden away in their cars as their parents physically shielded them; and the others had heard about the incident when the victims entered the church minutes ...