Elmo explains military absence

You know the deal: Your kid asks a question on a touchy subject. You squirm and dodge the issue.

With a little help from Elmo, Sesame Street is urging parents to level with their little ones – especially those in military families trying to deal with Mom or Dad’s lengthy deployment overseas.

“Our goal is to really get military families with young children … to talk about the different stages of deployment with their children, not only talk about it but prepare them for it,” said Jeanette Betancourt, vice president of content design at Sesame Workshop, which produces Sesame Street.

Sesame Workshop has produced a DVD, in both English and Spanish, that will be distributed free to military families next month. Wal-Mart has committed $1.5 million to the project.

Though it may be new for Elmo to dabble in deployment issues, local military officials say they’re always looking for ways to make the transitions easier for kids to understand.

Tech Sgt. Carlos RamosSanchez, family readiness coordinator at Fairchild Air Force Base, said children are given coloring books and explanatory books such as “My Parent is Being Deployed,” and “Mom Over the Miles,” as well as letter-writing kits and stickers.

One of the base’s most popular programs is a mock deployment line. Just prior to major deployments, children are run through the line so they will have a better idea of what preparations their parents are going through, RamosSanchez said.

The kids receive a briefing on the county their parents will be traveling to, and they receive financial briefings as well. Instead of shots, they’re given lollipops. Each child receives his or her own set of dog tags, has a talk with the chaplain and gets some coloring books explaining what their parents are going through. The kids are given a box lunch just like mom or dad would get and are brought to the boarding area. Finally, they board a base bus and are taken out for an afternoon of bowling.

“We want to show them how mom and dad are doing things,” RamosSanchez said. “We want it to end on a positive and happy note.”

Though he hadn’t seen the DVD yet, RamosSanchez said, “We’re always searching for new material.”

Karla Sketch, the family readiness coordinator at Fort Campbell, an Army base on the Kentucky-Tennessee line, says many parents are afraid of saying the wrong thing and frightening their children. “Are they going to tell their kids too much? Are they going to tell them enough? Some parents are new to the military. They don’t even understand it themselves,” Sketch said.

The DVD shows Elmo and his parents preparing for Elmo’s dad to be deployed, though it doesn’t say where he’s going.

The characters discuss their feelings, exchange keepsakes and review the reasons why Elmo can’t go, too. They promise to think about one another often, and keep up their regular practice of saying goodnight to the moon.

“Elmo, you know, no matter where I am, I’ll still be able to see the moon, just like you,” his dad says.

The DVD also addresses the mixed feelings that sometimes come unexpectedly with reunions. Elmo describes feeling “excited in a funny way” on reunion day. He goes on to say his tummy is doing flip-flops.

Sketch says that kind of dialogue is critical and often overlooked.

“A lot of times, after a year, you have to get to know that person again. Reunion is a process you have to get through,” she said. “It’s going to be great the first day, but it is a process, and it’s not just going to be back to business as usual as soon as that soldier comes home.”

Some half a million children of active duty personnel are newborn to 5 years old, said Leslye Arsht, deputy undersecretary of defense for military community and family policy.

Arsht said Sesame Street accurately and sensitively depicts what their lives are like by using show characters like Elmo, Telly and Rosita interspersed with interviews with real-life families throughout the DVD.