Being part of the military lifestyle is challenging at times for families. For military children moving frequently, leaving friends behind, and having to start anew at a different school can be quite a feat.
Dealing with a parent deploying to a combat zone can be even more traumatic and hard for a child to process. Fortunately, there are many resources to help your child successfully navigate the waters of living life as a military brat.
OurMilitaryKids.org
Our Military Kids helps to create positive distractions for military children separated from their parents because of deployments. The program assists in providing grants to cover fees for children’s activities for ages 3 years old through 12th grade. Activities include sports, the arts and various tutoring programs. Children of National Guard, Reservists and Wounded Warriors are eligible to apply.
MilitaryKidsConnect.org
Military Kids Connect connects children of deployed service members with resources to support them through an entire deployment. Children ages 6-17 can find activities geared toward their age range to assist them in understanding the deployment process, and ways to get through it. In addition kids can safely interact and gain support from their fellow peers.
DeploymentKids.com
Kids will find an assortment of games and activities at DeploymentKids.com to make getting through a deployment fun. Deployment Kids teaches everything from how to write a letter to send overseas, to creating homemade postcards. Along with this your children can brush up on math skills and geography by learning about distances, time zones and deployment locations.
BlueStarFam.org
Blue Star Families works hard to bring forth the challenges of military families to the civilian sector. They offer many great programs such as the annual Blue Star Museums program that offers free admission to military and their families at over 2,000 museums nationwide from Memorial Day through Labor Day. One of Blue Star’s recent programs is called the “Mil-Kidz Club” which offers free perks, tickets and events to military kids through the USO Metro.
MilitaryFamiliesNearAndFar.org
This website includes the likes of Elmo, Big Bird and the rest of the Sesame Street gang to not only help children but adults cope with the challenges of deployments by providing lots of tools and resources. Military children can indulge in music, videos and games with their favorite characters on MilitaryFamiliesNearAndFar.org.
More about military families
7 Things every military family should know about living on base
How being married to the military is different than civilian marriage
Moms with a cause: Advocating for military kids worldwide
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