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Safety in the workplace starts at home.
You can best protect your young one at their first job by instilling safe habits and expectations long before they enter the workforce. Safety awareness and skills can be ingrained from an early age.
By making safety a standard in all of their chores, projects, hobbies, or sports, you can ensure that your child carries the skills and, importantly, the expectation of safety with them into their future jobs.
But how exactly can you do this? Consistency is key; look for opportunities in day-to-day activities to build safe habits. Here are ten ways to ingrain a safety mindset in your child.
1. Cooking: Hygiene, fire safety, and food safety
Cooking is a necessary life skill, but it’s also a great opportunity to teach your kids about safety. What other lesson ends with a tasty reward?
Teach your kids the basics of handling hot surfaces, using oven mitts and potholders, and to never leave a hot stove unattended. Show them what to do if something catches on fire and explain how to treat grease fires differently.
You can also cover hygienic kitchen practices like frequent hand washing and understanding the dangers of cross-contamination. Be sure to explain kitchen safety basics, like using a meat thermometer, knife techniques, and not leaving food that requires refrigeration on the counter for an extended period.
2. Riding a bike is a quintessential part of childhood
Riding a bike is a quintessential part of childhood. When you’re teaching your child how to ride their bike, be sure to explain why wearing a helmet is important. Teach them about road safety and to be aware of potential hazards around them, obey traffic rules, and how to signal when turning.
By taking a proactive approach, you’re helping your child build spatial awareness, an understanding of the why behind PPE, and the importance of being alert in potentially dangerous but normal situations, like street traffic.
3. DIY projects: Tool safety and PPE
Have a wobbly table? Maybe a leaky shower? Or a cupboard that’s come off its hinges? DIY projects around the house can be an opportunity to both help your kid build life skills and instill a safety mindset. Teach them how to use tools correctly and the safety gear that comes along with them.
4. Sports: PPE and fair play
Helmets, pads, mouthguards, cleats… these are more than just items on an expensive shopping list. Sports can teach your kids about the importance of PPE, fair play and good sportsmanship. Safety is a team sport, after all.
5. Household chores: Ladder safety and chemical handling
When doing chores such as cleaning windows or changing light bulbs, it’s important to practice ladder safety. Teach your children how to use ladders properly. Always explain the proper methods for using cleaning products and other chemicals. Read the labels together to identify the required PPE for each chemical. This knowledge is essential, as your child may encounter substances like solvents in a workplace setting.
Chores like cleaning windows or changing light bulbs require ladder safety awareness. Teach your kids how to use ladders safely and emphasize the importance of handling cleaning chemicals properly to prevent incidents or injuries. Be sure to read the labels together and find out the type of PPE the chemicals call for.
6. Lawn care: PPE
Speaking of household chores, cutting the grass is a tried and tested way for teens to make a buck before entering the workforce officially. When you show your kids how to cut the grass, teach them the importance of wearing hearing protection, like earmuffs or earplugs, to protect their hearing and safe shoes to protect their toes. Making PPE a standard in your home will build the expectation of having PPE when your child starts working.
7. Garden maintenance: Hand protection and tool safety
Gardening can teach kids the importance of hand protection through the use of gloves. It's also an opportunity to educate them about tool maintenance and storage. Rusty broken-down tools pose a risk, as do tools left haphazardly strewn around.
8. Cleaning: Proper lifting techniques
Teach your children how to lift heavy objects safely when moving furniture to clean or putting things into storage. Musculoskeletal Disorders are a hazard in many workplaces. Make sure they know how to lift safely before they’re asked to do so on the job.
9. Car maintenance: Tire safety and emergency preparedness
Involve your kids in simple car maintenance tasks like checking tire pressure, = or changing a flat tire. Coaching them to recognize potential hazards (like proper positioning while using a jack) during these tasks will help develop safety awareness.
Teach them about emergency preparedness and the importance of keeping a first-aid kit and other safety equipment in the car. You can’t prepare your kid for every emergency in life, but you can give them the skills they need to think through an emergency critically.
10. Arts and crafts: Using tools and supplies
Arts and crafts can be a way to teach your younger children about safety. Using art supplies and tools, like scissors, paint, and glue, safely can help instill cautious behaviours from a young age.
Keeping your child safe at their first job can start when they’re young; at-home safety is for every age. The sooner you start having these conversations with your kids, the more natural safety will be for them.