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Expert Q&A

	By Adolph Brown Psychologist

My family and I will soon be moving from a big city to a small town in the country. As we will move in May, this will interrupt the school year. How can I best prepare my children ages 8, 6 and 5 for the new environment psychologically?

Paradoxically, the best way to prepare young children for departure is by focusing on leaving and by doing so fully. How you leave will give your child confidence about how you will start out. You might want to suggest a "goodbye project" that your kids will give to their classes, something to leave behind as a memory.

Talk to your children's teachers and see what their plans are for giving your kids a send-off. Consider having something that they can take with them from their class, such as goodbye letters, or other things that their classmates make for them.

Another excellent idea is to give your kids a few disposable cameras and let them take pictures of their rooms, their friends, whatever they might like to remember. A friend and colleague of mine had family outings the week before the move -- he, his wife and their four children took pictures around the town, at all their favorite spots, et cetera. Sometimes they went together as a family, sometimes there were special spots that one or both parents went to with one or some kids.

It also can be useful to make an excursion to the new place to take pictures of potentially new special or fun places. These pictures are good to have to show people at their "goodbye parties" because they will be asked about where they are going.

Remember that the Internet makes it easier than ever before to keep in touch. So help them collect friends', classmates' and even teachers' email addresses. Perhaps, since it is so close to the end of they school year, their teachers will offer to give them some email help with new work in their new school if they find it difficult. Such an offer will mean a lot to kids, even though they are very unlikely to take teachers up on it.

Finally, it is important to involve kids in planning their rooms, in making the new home theirs. The new house is most important to young children. That's where they need to feel comfort. Second most important to them is the school. And third is reassurance that they will still be in touch with family and friends. If you are able to cover these bases, you will be doing the most you can to help your children with what is so often a difficult transition.

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