Talk, Listen, Connect: Helping Military Families During Difficult Transitions
In 2006, Sesame Workshop CEO Gary Knell read a newspaper article about a soldier who was deployed in Iraq while his family was facing foreclosure on their home in the U.S. “I felt that there was so much rhetoric about helping our troops, but when push came to shove, there was a lack of action. I thought Sesame Workshop should find a way that really makes a difference,” he recalls. This provided the impetus for Talk, Listen, Connect, a program for our military families that builds on Sesame Workshop’s four-decades-long experience of working with children and families.
When the company began developing ideas for coping with the challenges of deployment, the addition of the Muppets emerged as a perfect and natural fit for Talk, Listen, Connect’s content and message. After all, who better than the trusted Sesame Street characters to reach out to children and parents and offer guidance while navigating the most challenging of transitions?
Since then, Talk, Listen, Connect has created numerous invaluable tools to assist and support military families with preschool-age children, and continues to address their needs using the power of the Sesame Street friends to bring awareness of their challenges and also of their great strength and resilience.
Talk, Listen, Connect is a multiphase, bilingual, multimedia initiative that guides families through multiple challenges, such as deployments, homecomings, and changes that occur when a parent comes home.
Throughout the years, the initiative has produced powerful materials with strategies for children, parents, caregivers, and service providers. Two media kits were developed, each including a video for parents and their preschool children; a companion guide; resources for adults and children; and an extensive online component. The materials help children and families understand and cope with difficulties, and in doing so, give military children a voice to express their feelings and concerns. For adults, the kits provide real-life examples of military families experiencing typical challenges, and supply them with the tools to manage and overcome changes in their family dynamics.
“It was a product that was desperately needed. We realized we had to put together some programs for the children because we understood that helping the war fighter meant taking care of the children as well,” says Navy Commander Russell Shilling, an advisor on psychological health at Defense Center of Excellence and a collaborator on Talk, Listen, Connect.
In addition to what Talk, Listen, Connect provides to military families, the project also helps create a national awareness of the selfless service those families provide the country every day. To that end, Sesame Workshop created two primetime specials that aired for the general public on PBS. The first, “When Parents Are Deployed,” starring Cuba Gooding, Jr., describes the three stages of transition families go through when experiencing pre-deployment, deployment, and homecoming. The most recent production, “Coming Home: Military Families Cope With Change,” featuring John Mayer, Queen Latifah, and the Sesame Street friends, aired in April 2009 and shares inspirational stories of military families experiencing physical, emotional, and psychological injury.
The initiative also aims to provide children in military families with opportunities to smile, laugh, and have fun. Talk, Listen, Connect’s live show, “Sesame Street Experience for Military Families,” and the Sesame Street “room-in-a-box” continue to give those children places to play, enjoy, and put aside any stress or worry they might be experiencing.
Heather Spencer, a military wife and mother of four explains, “The tour was so special because it offered families an opportunity to take their children out of a stressful environment. It made them feel like someone thinks they’re important and very special.”
The live show toured 42 military installations in the U.S. during the summer and fall of 2008, reaching over 75,000 people. It continues to resonate with military families near and far, with new appearances scheduled at military bases abroad.
The “Sesame Rooms” project provides a rich and engaging set of materials, delivered in a box, which will help to brighten up spaces and to create child-friendly environments for military children to play and learn. Boxes are being sent during July 2009 to hospitals, libraries, and family support centers serving military families.
Finally, our efforts to keep families connected led to Sesame Street Family Connections (www.SesameStreetFamilyConnections.org), a child-centered online space where both children and adults can interact and stay connected over long distances when everyday communication can otherwise be difficult.
Talk, Listen, Connect will continue to develop comprehensive efforts to support military families while addressing new issues and topics that are relevant to all children.
“If there’s one thing that parents know, it’s when Elmo talks, children listen,” says Nancy Kules, a Talk, Listen, Connect advisor and wife of Army First Lieutenant Ryan Kules, who was wounded in Iraq just six weeks before his tour of duty was to end. “Sesame Workshop really created a powerful resource for [military] families that no other organization could have created as well.”
With the help of Elmo, Rosita and other members of the Muppet family, Talk, Listen, Connect not only helps children understand deployment and homecoming, but also invites other members of the family to approach deployment with a constructive and confident attitude.
A summary study for the first phase of the project, which dealt with a parent’s first deployment, revealed that the materials helped military parents and children feel better during deployment, and helped them to be prepared emotionally for the deployment process. It also showed that Talk, Listen, Connect is helping parents by giving them the language and tools they need to engage in a dialogue with their children.
The impact of Talk, Listen, Connect has also been proven by the overwhelming response and enormous demand for its media kits, one million of which have been distributed by July 2009.
Research about the effects of Talk, Listen, Connect on families experiencing multiple deployments and injuries is forthcoming. Informal feedback indicated that Talk, Listen, Connect has set an exceptionally high bar in fulfilling an unmet need in military communities by speaking directly to children and to their parents. One Army Staff Sergeant recalls, “We had a triple amputee come in recently who had not seen his 3-year-old daughter since his injury and was afraid of how she would react. I gave him the Talk, Listen, Connect kit and explained the materials to him. He was so happy that he started to cry with joy. He asked me to say thank you … as it was going to help with his reunion with his daughter. It was a very emotional moment. Thank you so much.”
Elmo has a special message to all the young military kids out there, “Elmo wants you to know that you should talk to your mommy or daddy about your feelings. Doing that helps Elmo feel a lot better. And Elmo wants you to know that your mommy and daddy always love you ... forever! Oh, and Elmo loves you too!”
Elmo’s story and experiences will continue to reflect those of military children. Because of their service and strength, military children make Elmo and Sesame Street proud.
