Illinois Home Security: Practicing With Your Family

• September 11, 2015
• by Carlos Lopez

You know all the basic Illinois home security tips. You have a security system, and you’re fairly sure that most of the members of your family know how to use it. You have good, solid locks on your doors. You even have a self-defense plan in place. Here’s the question: how much of your plan does your family know and understand?  

If you have small children at home, it’s tempting to avoid talking to them about what will happen if you have a break-in. After all, there’s no reason to scare them, right? However, working with your children to practice the steps you’d take in the event of an emergency is an important part of your home security plan.  

As a parent, the most terrifying part of a break-in is the possibility that someone will get between you and your children. You don’t need to scare your kids to teach them how to help prevent that from happening. How will your child respond if there’s an emergency in your home? If you don’t teach them, they won’t know the correct answer. Talk to them about what to expect if there’s a break in. What will it sound like when the alarm goes off? What will you ask them to do? Where will you stay until the house is safe again? By going over these steps with your kids, you help increase their feeling of safety and security and decrease their fear if an emergency does occur. Be sure to stress how well your house is protected. You have a security system and the police will come to help you. Knowing what to expect will allow your children to feel safer if someone does attempt to break in to your home.

Discuss Their Responses

In the event of an emergency, no matter what it might be, you need your children to listen to you immediately. They shouldn’t argue the way they might when you issue instructions under a different situation, like cleaning their room. To help facilitate this, practice a code word with your kids. When you say that word, it doesn’t matter what you tell them to do.  They have to do it immediately, quietly, and without argument.  Practice this periodically.  It will help them learn to respond to you immediately–and in an emergency, that can be critical.  

Your code word doesn’t have to be complicated.  It can be as simple as saying, “I need you to listen to me immediately,” if that’s what works for your family.  The trick is to have a system that your family understands.

Learn How They Respond

Set the security system off one evening when you and your family don’t have any other plans. You don’t have to kick it off in the middle of the night to see how the kids will respond when they are disoriented and groggy. Simply give them the opportunity to practice what they would do in the event of an emergency and see how they respond. Which child is prone to panic? Which one starts crying and can’t be consoled? When you know these things, you can better prepare for the possibility of an emergency in your home.

Looking for more ways to increase your home security? Need to install a security system?  Contact us today to see how we can help.

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