One thing that may help you is to have a rehearsal to prepare yourself for an emergency situation. This could be as simple as sitting down as a family to talk over different scenarios to as elaborate as actually having the children picked up from school and taken home in the middle of the day. It depends on what your family needs to do in order to be comfortable in the situation. If you have a child with special needs an actual run through of the event may help to prepare them more for an emergency. Here are some specific guidelines to follow.
1) Determine which types of emergencies your family will want to prepare for and discuss. This includes fire, earthquakes, evacuations, hurricanes, tornadoes, and ice storms. You may also want to discuss the possibility of a medical emergency in the family.
2) Next decide the type of practice you should have as a family. A fire drill is a good idea if you are preparing for the possibility of a fire. You may want to practice all of the different ways to evacuate from the building. My family did this when I was a child, and we did practice leaving through the window. We got some pretty strange looks from the neighbors, but I wouldn’t have known how to remove the screen otherwise. If hanging ladders are involved then you will want to practice how to use those safely as well.
3) Once you have set up the initial plan it is important to practice and/or review the plan every few months. This may be seasonal as well. You may review what to do during a tornado in the early spring, or how to respond to a hurricane in the early summer.
4) Answer any questions that your children may have. Be sure to monitor how they are feeling. You do not want to scare your children as you talk about these scenarios, but rather prepare them for the possibility of them happening.
If you take the time to complete these plans now you will be better prepared to deal with emergency situations. If you have already conditioned yourself on how to respond to an emergency you will save precious seconds because you will not need to be spending time deciding what to do. Good luck!