Fire safety advice for children is important for any age from pre-school and nursery kids to teenagers. From the dangers of children playing with matches to the deadly effect of smoke inhalation it’s important for nurseries, schools and parents to regularly provide a thorough education in fire safety. There are countless fun and interactive fire safety websites to help teach about dangers and hazards around the home like electrical plugs, naked flames and matches. Also remember to follow the Firework Code for a safe and enjoyable Bonfire Night.
Educational fire prevention resources for the home or school classroom include quizzes, worksheets and interactive or printable ‘Spot the Hazard’ activities and pictures to colour in. There are some fire safety themed on-line games to keep kids interested while learning about the importance of dangers in the home and some great themed stories covering important advice like the Firework Code. Try some of our favourite links below to explore some great examples of safety websites that are ‘Free For Kids’.
Hampshire Fire and Rescue have a site stands out from many of the others. Follow the link entitled ‘Kidzone and schools’ and you’ll find a treasure trove of colourful, fun and informative fire safety training resources for children. There are games, quizzes, history lessons, crossword puzzles, jigsaws, dress-up, and much much more. Look for the ‘Kidzone associated resources for teachers/learning support’ link and teachers can benefit from printables categorised into Key Stage 1, Key Stage 2 and Key Stage 3. One of our favourite fun activities is the ‘Build a Fire Engine Game’ which gives you a ‘flat pack’ fire engine to assemble using drag and drop. For something more educational and useful in the event of an emergency we like the dialing 999 simulation which guides children through the process and clearly demonstrates what they need to say.
(Some of the games may only work in Internet Explorer )
Look for the ‘Education and Guidelines’ link at Kidde Safety and then let Fire Chief Kidde Bear take children through a short interactive booklet about fire hazards and other dangers around the home. Good for teachers’ resources, this concise safety education lesson covers topics like the dangers of playing with matches, ‘Stop, Drop and Roll’ if clothes catch fire and the hazards of smoke. There’s guidance too for children to create a fire escape plan, the importance of smoke alarms, and 999 emergency calls. Most of all young children will enjoy the colourful and fun interactive ‘spot the hazard’ pages where they get to explore a kitchen, lounge, bedroom and garden for fire hazards. ( Sometimes only works in Internet Explorer )
The National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) would like to introduce you to Sparky The Fire Dog who’s on a mission to teach children about the dangers of fire and the importance of having a home fire escape plan. Free parents and teachers’ resources include printable colouring pages and activity sheets plus on-line fire safety videos and animations. There are also fun games like the ‘Fire Truck Game’ and even a gallery of fire engine pictures. We particularly like the interactive fire trucks where kids can click on different parts of the fire truck (such as the control panel or ladder) and learn more about what they do and how the fire truck works.
Another one of our favourite sites is Switched On Kids which is all about electrical safety. An understanding of electric and how overloading plugs and sockets can cause fires is a valuable too in a kid’s fire prevention toolbox. Using the ‘socket overload calculator’ children (and adults!) can drag common appliances onto a four-gang extension and see whether it gets overloaded and consequently dangerous. All the usual suspects are there – laptop, monitor, games console, phone – but there are plenty of household appliances (iron, hairdryer, dishwasher, etc) which tend to be the ones that draw the most current and therefore quickly overload the socket’s capacity.
FIRE KILLS! YOU CAN PREVENT IT … say Essex County Fire and Rescue Service. Their free Home Safety Game is available to play on-line and it’s a fun and engaging way for children to understand what fire hazards may exist around the home, how to spot them and how to remedy them. There are three locations to check – bedroom, kitchen and lounge – and kids get to click on the interactive scenes to check for dangers. In the kitchen there is even mention of a family escape plan which is a valuable tool in training and clearly showing children exactly what to do if they need to escape from a fire. In the kitchen there is also mention of a very modern safety problem and that is ‘distractions’; back in the day our relatives did not have the distraction of (sometimes several) screens in the kitchen which are constantly demanding our attention.
The Children’s Burns Trust have learning zones for pre-school children, infants, juniors and teenagers. Younger kids will enjoy the fun free printable Welephant colouring pages, and there are fire safety quizzes and on-line games for older children who can also test their skills at a firefighter training school where you get to squirt water at fires!. Teenagers (KS3, KS4) can learn valuable life-lessons about the danger of fire by watching a shocking video that tells the real life story of a teenager who was unfortunate enough to receive 90% burns. The well organised sections are split into Key Stage Groups e.g. Early Years Age 0-4, Key Stage 1 Age 5-7, Key Stage 2 Age 7-17, etc along with a section for ‘Parents, Carers and Professionals’.