single parents and sometimes an elderly grandmother. they may not have a chance to participate in afterschool are working and cannot pick them up. every day some amazing parent or caretaker is of her, and all of it to give these kids a chance at a better life. consistently found that children struggle in comparison than children raised in more stable family settings. they face a higher risk ofhave lower scores on standardized tests, lower grades, and a much higher chance of dropping out of high school or failing to attend college. this societal breakdown is not something the government has solved, but it is something they cannot ignore. you cannot separate economic well-being of of your people from their social well-being. do is limited, but it is important. rather than pretend we know the answer, we should do as paul ryan suggests by engaging in mentoring young people and leading them onto the right path -- their teachers, coaches, priests, pastors. conversation in trading a social success. we should look at churches and faith-based or

item e parent advisory counciloéñ?ñ?ake this opportunity to present our pac report tonight to formally introduce myself. since the last pac report that i was officially hired. my name is georgia williams pratt and i just want to)'iaoçíy acknowledge that hiring internally and along with the support of former staff has -- itself it a smoothz]ár<- transition. and allowed the pac work to continue as planned. one of our priorities this year has been -- practices and to date we've had three conversations at three different schools and we continue6ek$-vy to get requestsn, parents to come and give whole community conversations in their communities. and along with that work we're going to continue to do we're considering some other options about additional work and additional steps for restorative practices and one of those is to follow up with questions that we continue to hear at community conversations from parents and staff, about data, suspension expulsion rates at particular sites as well as data around class referrals and

we noticed we have had parents who came in there was greater participation with those parents, parentsork we doc&y>urgr how important that is for students and parents in our district to have that access. so i don't know if there are any questions this evening. and i'm really happy to be hereto >> commissioner fewer. >> commissioner fewer: thankk3çkwf'd<&fç you. thank you to the pac also for submitting questions to the curriculum committee because the questions that you have as parents are probably the same questions that our parents have. so thank you very much. when you're compiling your data byvúu"x&b schools and your suspension discipline data, and your+]Ñ+wÑy restorative practice research, i think it's important also to ask for that and also by -- and i thinkwueb0ç it would give you a clearer picture sort of what is happening around discipline and sort@ guess defined sort of picture of where we're at with discipline. but thank you for taking# uijpv that on and i invite you to come to the next curriculum meeting because we'll beñcñháq discussing the a through g thing again. but,u-6l

my name is gloria and a member of the parent advisory committee and parent of two children and i wanted to extend my congratulations to all the achievements presented earlier today with staff and schools and our representatives. so thank you for your hard work and dedication. and for your commitment. i wanted it make comments on several areas that the pac has worked on. pac will continue conducting some community conversations when asked. the pac is considering expanding its work with restorative practice by promoting the parent component of the whole school implementation. and the project team wants to look at how parents are being brought into the implementation process of restorative practices at the three demonstration schools and the focus schools. where practice parent is in place and the pac hopes to share successful strategies that the schools are currently using to inform familis about restorative practices and be able to engage them in [-eurpblts/]ing implementing the process. we want to be able to create a parent- friendly material guide that parents can use on an everyday us

do you know a lot of the parents? >> i heknow a girl who's a teacher's aid there and she was already evacuated. i know the music teacher, i know a lot of people there, and my kids are friends with kids that go there. >> is the teach your talked to, did he or she fill in any of the blanks of what's happened there? what did they tell you happened at sandy hook elementary school? >> i texted her briefly and asked if she was okay and she said yes, she was evacuated and i didn't hear anything further from her. >> thanks so much for your perspective. >> thank you. >>> we want to go now to -- >> we're working on getting some more information from another business owner at the scene, but as we're looking now, there is some indication, as you can see there on the bottom left of your screen, you see parents walking through the scene right now, with children that look to be the right age for a k through 4 school. that's a greet sign. you can see liz interviewing a mom right now. >> let's listen in. >> she locked the door, she ha

home and parents are busy. if, you know, the communication isn't great. or even if the communication is great, often kids are ashamed, they're afraid that, um, either their parents won't take them seriously, or if they do take them seriously, that they're going to march into school and do something that's going the make the situation even worse. and in situations where kids don't trust that the adults are going to be able to make the situation better or make it stop without actually, um, making them feel more alienated or making the bullies know that they've told someone in such a way that now it's going to get even worse, kids don't want to tell. and i think the kids often don't necessarily even want to perceive what's going on as bullying. so i think that one of the things for parents who suspect their kids may be bullied or any parent is to find ways to talk to their kids about what's going on at school in a way that isn't necessarily saying are you being bullied. >> host: uh-huh. well, you know, you raise a

for the parents and grand parents and sisters and brothers of these little children and for the families of the adults that are lost. our hearts are broke an for the parents of the survivors as well, as blessed as they are to have their children home with them, but their innocence has been torn away from them and no words that will ooze the pain. as a cub we have been through this too many times. whether it is an law enforcement school in newton or a shopping mall in oregon or a temple in since or a movie theater in aurora or a street corner in chicago. these neighborhoods are our neighborhoods and these children are our children. we are going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this regardless of the politics. this evening michelle and i will do whatever parent will do, hug our children a little tighter and we will tell them that we love them and we'll remind each other how deeply we love one another. but there are families in connecticut that cannot do that tonight. and they need all of us right now. and our days to come, that community ne

and from a parent's standpoint, that again was very understandable. why would you take something out of vaccines in such a precipitous and frightening manner unless there was a problem? >> too many, too soon. >> when i began my crusade for autism, one of the first speeches gave was: is it mercury? is it the schedule? is there just too many? my answer to people and what i've been telling them is, it's all of the above. we don't know for sure, which is why we keep saying, "study it." but they won't. >> narrator: in fact, around the world, scientists had been studying groups of children, searching for a possible link between vaccines and autism using the same epidemiological methods that linked smoking to lung cancer. one country renowned for its epidemiology is denmark. unlike the us, danish authorities collect demographic and health data routinely on the entire population in a series of national registers. they know when every child was born, when every child was vaccinated, and when every case of autism was diagnosed. >> it's sort of a paradise for ep

, parents being very angry that i think for parents to get who get those phonecalls, some of them can be the best phonecall you get in your life because if you don't know this is happening, if you don't know that your sweet little child is getting on the bus and being a tyrant, you never have the opportunity to address the. >> host: it's in that context i think that your book talks about the difference between punishment and discipline. >> guest: yeah, absolutely. it's not about punishing in such a way as to shut down the conversation about how do we develop understanding? how do we develop empathy? how do we take responsibility for our actions and i think that with what the hope is for intervention is affected is that it doesn't only change the life of the person that is being targeted but hopefully it changes the life of the person who is perpetrating the behavior. >> host: you know i was interested that there are a number of steps that are laid out in terms of the apology and i think one of the significant points that was made is that it's not about shaming for either the bully or

but it was when they told the parents, all these parents were waiting for their children to come out, they thought that they were, you know, still alive. and those 20 parents that were just told that their children are dead. it was awful. >> and you were unable to do anything. >> right. we knew at one point they asked the ambulances to leave, that they didn't need them, and we knew that wasn't a good sign. >> alexis, you told me you were sitting in class this morning, and you saw a lot of police. tell me how you found out what was going on. >> well, we found, like, there was all these people, and we found because it was right near the window in our classroom, and, like, we saw, like, police officers and we heard them on the roof and in our building. >> was everybody crying, scared, wanting their parents to come get them? >> yeah. they were. and then some people were even, like, they kind of felt they got a stomach ache. >> did you hear any gunshots or anything like that? >> well, the police officers, like, they were -- they were kind of, because they were police officers, like right o

what do you say to a parent? what do you say to a parent who is going through the worst possible kind of grief imaginable? >> you know, i had a number of conversations with parents today. a number of people belong to the parish community. the words are few. what can you say? many said thank you for many here with us. we prayed together, hugged each other, a lot of tears. certainly a lot of emotion, and i -- i don't really think it's settled into their lives. their child has been taken from them. i must say for the parents i spoke with today, there was a tremendous amount of love for these children, and i know that the days ahead are going to be very, very difficult. we as a community, certainly as a church community will be very present to them. but the words? what can you say at a time like this? >> there are a lot of parents wrestling around the country and around the world with what are they going to say to their children who ask them questions about this. what do you recommend for people to say to their kids.

and all the parents knew that.t's a shocking thing beyond belief that this has happened and that it's -- we are just heartbroken for those families. >> reporter: we are, too. thank you for talking to us. thank you for your time. so you heard there's two children in their family, a third grader and first grader. the first grader who seems to have lost numerous friends, close friends. i know parents here struggle with the challenge of how to tell their children their friends are dead and obviously the parents who have lost children struggle as well with how to go on with their lives. a terrible story to have to cover, a terrible story to live through. we have to take a short break. as i mentioned before, we are waiting for this press conference to begin. the state police has been really good about updating us on the very latest in their process in this case. they are a little delayed on the press conference, and it is unclear why, but maybe we'll have a chance to understand why they are wrapping this up and doing. we

any parent out there can relate.charles raison is with the university of arizona's college of medicine >> "how do you wrap your mind around something like this? with a good deal of heartbreak and with the understanding that it's gonna take awhile and that there will be people that were closely impacted by this who will never wrap minds around this. you know, human minds are not infinite and, you know, this is now appearing to be the world school yard catastrophe in history and so there's gonna be a huge long-term fallout for this that is gonna also impact people's emotional well being and we need to gear ourselves up for that fallout because it's coming because this is a horrible thing." >> the news out of newtown is traumatic for parents...and for children... this happened at a school where kids are supposed to feel safe. >> "how do you explain this to children? well, again, it depends on the age of the child but i think simple, forthright explanations are the best, and i think....one of things that i tell children

i am also a parent at creative arts. i am also here about the proposal to co-locate gateway middle school with its 300 students on our campus. and to ask you to direct your staff to take the proposal off the table. as i think you all know we have had some challenges recently, particularly with last year's fire, and the aftermath of that. but we have a really resilient community. and we have managed to weather the challenges pretty well and we're really looking forward to next year when the repairs from the fire and the construction will be over and things will settle down. but if an additional 300 students are shoehorned into that campus there will not be any settling down. when i try to contemplate 300 additional middle schoolchildren, all i can envision is pandemonium. i can't imagine any children would get enough time outside if there were an additional 300 children on the campus. part of the reason my family choose this particular school it's a small k-8 and my daughter thrives in the close knit community. and i am w

not even just the parents emotional. we saw them coming to pick up the students, hugging them tight and starting to cry because of all of this happening here. we also know that the first responders were breaking down. we saw firefighters who were tearing up and now we actually might understand why. when we see, you know, the large complexity of this and how many people were affected here. >> amanda, do stand by for me. we have got some sound from folks who are at the scene at sandy hook elementary school around 9:30 this morning. let's take a listen. >> i was in the gym and i heard a loud -- well, i heard like seven loud booms and then the gym teachers told us to go in the corner so we all huddled and i kept hearing these booming noises. and the -- we all started -- well, we didn't scream, we started crying so all of the gym teachers told us to go in to the office where no one could find us so then police officer came in and told us to run outside so we did and we came in the fire house and waited for our parents. >> tha

the school is trying to keep parents informed there and at the same time they are asking parents noto go to the school. >> you can imagine what kind of ex crucial ating request that is that they are asking that you wait for them. buses have been cancel ltd. no buses are running at this point. those are s.w.a.t. officers. they have their helmet and camouflage on. they are gathering outside of the front door. what we do know at this point is that the entire area is in lockdown. one gentleman has been taken into custody at least they want to talk to him. he was telling a parent that he was not involved. that's what police do, they lock the entire down and get anyone they want to talk to and try to figure out what is going on. >> especially when someone is on the scene like this wearing camouflage. guns were still drawn and the last report we had from him just a few moments ago was saying that things were not getting better. that this is a bad scene. the hospitals, we know, have been prepared although we're hearing that the hospital in bridgeport has now said that it's not expecting anyo

she talked about parents without kids, not surprising, that parents would rush to the scene.o talked about little kids who looked like they were younger than elementary. i can tell you that next door to that preschool called the adventure school, so very young children that she may have seen may not have been indeed from the elementary school, but from the preschool next door, but also s.w.a.t. teams on the scene, emergency vehicles on the scene. let's bring in clint vanzant, our fbi profiler. the police who would be called in, what would be the first thing they would do? >> it seems like we just did this last week and the reality is we did at the shopping mall in oregon and here we go one more time. in these school shootings, once again, we have learned that children cannot wait, to wait for the s.w.a.t. team to do a tactical -- the first two or three responding officers, local police, deputy sheriffs, they go ahead and make a tactical entry and their whole job is to penetrate into the building and go to the shoote

your parents sign up for it.ssage saying from the superintendent that there was up an unconfirmed shooting and everybody is in lockdown. >> what did you think? >> i was like, oh, my gosh. then i had no idea that it was her school. i'm like -- it just seemed so unreal. my heart is in a million pieces right now for parents and the children and for everybody because it's -- who would ever think in a small town and people -- you know, i mean, the school is locked. >> we're going to affiliate wcbs for more information, what they're learning on the ground as well. let's listen in. >> that is what that woman was going through. she showed up ready to do her job, but there was nothing she could do. the people that were able to be helped removed from the scene. she watched in horror and is going home to try and process that. >> you're absolutely right, lou. you're absolutely right. that is the worst thing that can happen when you set up the triage to do the first aid, and it's simply he beyond that. we have seen it. >> lou

i want to thank the parents, all the parents involved individually. but in particular the parent groups whether it's the pac, our own pac or advocates, parents who contribute and challenged the school board was really important for us to be able to step up and say yes, we are hearing certain things and we want to respond to. it so thank you parents. students, again, these accomplishments wouldn't have happened without the students also caring and wanting to improve themselves. and we're just so fortunate to have these 55,000, 56,000 students ready and eager to learn and hopefully we'll present them the opportunity to learn. again, i have had the opportunity for eight years to really see the faces of the brightest and best and the leadership of our students, the people that students who sit on our board of student delegates, including windy and megan. i have seen some remarkable students come through here as student delegates and if i had more time i would rattle their names off as accomplishments and the student advisory council has grown from struggl

we don't know what all the stories are, but essential as a parent -- but not just as a parent. for every one of us who sends, you know, our mom off for the day or our spouse off or our kids, you know, this idea that we live in such a contingent environment where at any point, you know, your child might be shot at a gas station or might be a victim of violence in a school, that is about the availability of guns, so let's just be really clear. you know, we live in a world where bad things happen in a ton of different ways. in the american context, the idea that someone you love or yourself could be the victim of gun violence, particularly if it's random gun violence, is because of the availability of handguns in this country, and it's hard to imagine being about any other thing. >> also, there's the question -- michael eric dyson, we talked about institutional failure in a political context, but here you have schools, right, which are in and of themselves supposed to be a sacred place, that have become places where the students are victims effectively, and what does that do to es

promises to the parents and the students. and i would have to say as a counselor and i feel like i know this area really well, that this was not met so far with the class of 2014. and to start now when they are juniors, the question is what was going on before? i knew what was going on before. i knew what was going on when they were freshmen. we would have conversations about it in our counseling department all the time. how did it get this way? so now we're scrambling. okay? and it's really -- the question to all of you is not the product -- not the end product, but how did we get there? if you don't fix the dynamic it's going to continue on. instead of having the public relations department have excuses about we don't have money for this and this kind of stuff, you know what you should be saying? i'm sorry, we didn't do it. we didn't have the support. we got to do better and we should do better. and you should be doing better with the sophomore class. there should be someone working on that right now, okay? so i'm tired of

so one of the things for the parents that suspect their kids might be bullied or any parent is to find a way to talk to their kids about what's going on at school in a way that isn't necessarily saying are you being bullied? >> host: well, you know, you raise an interesting point. it kind of rolls off the tongue, finding ways to talk to your cade about what's going on in school and to identify with their various bullying going on. but i think that it's probably fair to say that most parents would give their left arm to not do that. what kind of suggestions you have for parents to help their kids talk to them? >> guest: it gets harder as kids get older and very much want independence so i think that the different levels of the questions and the conversations can be more or less direct. i think for kids that are at under stages or at the end of elementary school it can be much easier to broach the topic. questions or conversations about who fits in with the group, who is sort of playing with two? who seems to be ostracized? i think those questions can be answered more directly for kids w

parents's permission. their parents are there on the scene. we don't talk to the children unless the parents say they want the child to speak out and they are there to watch these interviews. we are very sensitive to young children in these kind of tragedies. obviously a lot of families are feeling the pain right now. we heard earlier from the president of the united states. let's bring in dr. drew pinsky, the host of dr. drew on our sister network, hln. we have been talking about what's going on. these kind of tragic incidents often can be prevented if loved ones, family members and neighbors and friends pay attention to warning signs. >> that's right, wolf. paying attention is the big lesson from so much we have been hearing in the news. denial by family members and parents is the enemy. you cannot imagine how many situations i have been in where i give family members very specific directions to prevent disasters and they choose to stay in denial and come to terms with the fact that their loved one is no

-- all parents have a tough time. the object isn't hard to know whether kids are being heard, terrorized, bullied. but it is also, i would imagine, important for all parents, whether or not their children are being bullied, whether or not their children have a role in the social fabric. i'm sure there are lots of to think of the kids perfectly happy, and it turns out that they may have -- they may be bullied. so questions like what goes on on the school bus,. >> guest: that's correct, where you sit on the school bus. i think that you will find a lot of kids will sit in the school bus, and you'll go to the school estimates you unless you really want to get it. some kids are terrified about what is going on back there. cemented a question about what we would like you by what is going on, where does it seem not save? where you feel safe? i think i kind of know a lot more about the social dynamics within the groups of kids that will come to their house after school, those that they will see on the weekends, i think just b

there was 20 parents that were just told that their children are dead. it was awful. >> reporter: one six-year-old boy who was in a classroom when the gunman came in and shot the teacher has told his father that as all of this was unfolding at this elementary school down the road, the shooter, scott, never said a word. >> pelley: jim, thank you. police tell us, as jim said, that that silent man was the son of one of the teachers. justice correspondent bob orr has been talking to his sources about what we know about him so far. bob? >> reporter: scott, police tell us that it's clear the gunman was on a mission to kill as many people as possible. he took at least three guns, multiple magazines of ammunition to target a defenseless we're not even putting a time stamp on this as to when we will complete this project. >> reporter: sources say lanza died of a self-inflicted gunshot inside the school, but investigators suspect he may have intended to carry out a broader attack. a third gun, a .223 assault rifle, was found outside the school in the back of his m

her parents say her zest for life began early. a happy baby who grew into a happy little girl with an affinity for anything fun. she loved dancing and tennis, soccer, drawing, and singing. olivia also loved school, especially math and reading. she was proud to be a big sister for a little brother braden, who has been looking for her ever since the tragedy. >> he keeps asking, where is via, where is via? he's acting like any normal 3-year-old should. he's completely innocent, and she was completely innocent. and he has kept that innocence even if the nation has lost it. >> olivia's pastor said she was an angel in life and now she's an angel in heaven. grace mcdonnell loved school so much she used to skip on her way to the bus stop. the last time her mom saw grace, she was smiling, waving, blowing kisses from the bus. she was 7 years old. grace loved to draw and paint. she also loved the beach and her dream was to grow up to be a painter and live on martha's vineyard where her family spent their summer vacations. her parents say gra

who came in there was greater participation with those parents, parents who were on hand to answer questionstheir native language is we want forefront of our work we doc&y>w important that is for students and parents in our district to have that access. so i don't know if there are any questions this evening. >> commissioner fewer. >> commissioner fewer: thankk3ç you. thank you to the pac also for submitting questions to the curriculum committee because the questions that you have as parents are probably the same questions that our parents have. so thank you very much. when you're compiling your data byvúu"x&b schools and your suspn discipline data, and your+]Ñ+wÑy restorative practice research, i think it's important also to ask and also by -- and i thinkwueb0t would give you a clearer picture sort of what is happening around discipline and sort@ guess defined sort of picture of where we're at with discipline. and i invite you to come to the next curriculum meeting because we'll beñcñháq discussing the a through g thing again. but,u-6le@4 also, since superint carranza mentioned]vuçov the

>> i think the parents need to seek the support of other parents. they need to talk about it and process it. in many ways i think this strategidy is harder for the parents than the kids. but they need to be careful because they're emotional and young kids take the cues on how worried to be from their parents. so importaparents, for instance to pick up the kids today, maybe more emotional seeing their kids and might give them a tighter hug but i think parents need to keep the emotions in check because if they run to their kids and crying and squeeze them, kids are a little freaked out and wonder what's going. kids take the cues from the parents so the parents need to make sure whenever they're around the kids, they have their own emotions in check so that that way the kids end up feeling more secure and safe. >> right. easier said than done. thank you so much for that. and in a situation like this, we know hospitals snap in to trauma mode. dr. mike am anderson is chief medical officer at university hospital's case medical center in cleveland and spec

but these parents are really keeping me going.at their strength and i figure if i can't keep going, what good am i? i have a great faith. this hasn't shaken my faith in the lord and in humanity. i'm looking at the parents and drawing great, great strength from them. this community, as i'm sure you have realized, is an incredible place of care. many people move here, they don't have extended family, so their friends become family for them and they draw a great deal of strength from that. that's what we're all about here. i'm happy not because of the situation. i'm happy that the world gets to know that there's still a community like this. >> i have heard so many people say to me remarkable things about you. i really appreciate you talking to us. >> i don't know if you have a green and white >> i do, and i have the bracelet as well. thank you very much. >> bless you. >>> monsignor weiss. as we talked about, one of the funerals at his church today was for grace mcdonnell, 7 years old. in the week since the tragedy, i was able to get

children do not pass before their parents. we began to see that the school, the high school in los gatos, led by a very strong, great principled people, brought in an organization to help and after all i should preface in 2009 was a brutal year for los gatos high school, they lost two other students shortly before jill died. the school and principal brought in a counseling group called cassie, counseling and support services for youth, embedded counseling. and their job was to change the culture, very much what we've heard today, change the culture to get rid of the stigma of mental health and understanding that a lot of these kids feel anxiety and stress, they need someone to talk to. they just don't have the perspective that an adult has. >> one of the things that struck me was the boys were interviewed, they knew they were in trouble, but i didn't hear them say i'm sorry, i shouldn't have sent the picture on. >> the three boys were arrested and they complied with a vuft stis program and part of that program was to write a l

children. >> parents, all these parents were waiting for their children to come out. they thought they were, you know, still alive. and there's 20 parents that were just told that their children are dead. it was awful. >> the father of a young girl who survived was just trying to process it all. >> it was shocking. i got the call at work this morning and -- i can't believe a small town like this would ever have anything like this happen. and to be in an elementary school, it's unheard of. >> by late friday afternoon and into the evening, evacuated children were being cared for and reuniting with their parents at a nearby fire house. brian todd, cnn, washington. >> we're also getting a lot of questions about how you can help those affected. if you want to help, go to cnn.com/impact. john? >> thanks so much, ali. as everyone knows, our focus as much as it can be is on victims. there is an investigation going on right now. there are so many questions. and we're learning more now about the suspected shooter in this case. police say his name is adam lanza. cnn's mary snow

parents like victor mendoza looked at the flier. it's something he was apprehensive about. >> i don't know how i would deal wit. especially if it was at my son's school. >> if we keep them informed and we are informed, we just have to pray and help for the best. >> reporter: oakland unified school district has a staff of dozens of child psychologists and counselors they are available whenever violence strikes in oakland. >> we do have a certain level of readiness that we've acquired just because of the climate and the situations we're required to grapple with. >> reporter: now the counseling staff is on stand by to help children deal with the tragedy. >> because of the youth of the victims and the tragedy of death. >> reporter: before parents speak to their kids they need to assess their feelings first. >> to think through what you feel so you don't scare your kids. >> reporter: let your kids ask questions but above all reassure them. >> make sure that kids know that the adults around are looking out for them. ready to help them bot

i knew he was safe. >> and, yet, the cruelty is some parents were elated and relieved and other parents are crushed and scared. i mean, how will this community deal with that? that's what my brother is going through. like christmas day for him and hell for others. i'm extremely excited and happy with my nephew's well being, there were parents that don't have that same fortune. and it tears our heart apart to have to even think about that close so close to christmas. it rips at my heart. i can't say it any more than that. elated. family going through a lot right now. they will be getting counseling for their son because post-traumatic stress, those things that come to play. they will pull together like this community. this is one heck of a town thieves these people are great. the fiber of this community was woken up by the devil himself. this town will rise up again. it has no choice but to. these people stick together. >> i heard one of the victims was an angel in the christmas pageant that one of the churches downtown. all of having various memorials. you worked in hospice care. it's a

you have parents descending on the scene. i can tell you several hours later when i was driving to the school, how backed up the traffic was. it wasn't easy to get to the school. once you got there, obviously, it was utter and complete chaos. there were so many emergency vehicles there. just community people coming to the scene as well as parents coming to the scene and skrtryi to make those positive identifications. getting the children, getting an id, literally, a physical id from the parent, not allowing the child to go until they could confirm that it was with the person they should be with. i can tell you that they were able to confirm several hours ago that every child had been acounted for. obviously, there's a point at which you want to know what kids might have called in sick that cay. what kids might be somewhere else. it takes several hours in a situation like this. yes, the parents who had not been reunited with their children were pretty much all gathered together in the fire house and you can just imagine what i

these kids have parents, their parents are worried.ld they do with their kids who have survived. >> the kids who have survived -- >> from this school? >> i think they need to talk to them about empg that the child brings up. you want to ask them every detail, every question, you do still want to be able to provide some reassurance. you do not want to be judgmental in any way. any emotion yaur child is experiencing is an acceptable emotion. you want to show them how much you love them. you want to talk to them about how this is such a rare event and that this is not going to happen again to them, that they need to be able to eventually go back to school. this is going to take a wile for them to feel better. that they can expect that for a little while, a week, several days, the kids are going to have some difficulties potentially. things like feeling really clingy to their parents, not wanting to sleep alone, having nightmares. these are all things that i think the parents need to tell their kids, and in particular i think the parents n

but how about for those parents?rieving or saw their kids friends will no longer be coming home? >> i don't think there is anything that can prepare you for something like that. there is a period of shock that is normal the thing people can do that is most helpful is just be there. it sounds simple but not easy when you want to help as best you can. being present and available to the folks there is critical. and to use compassion or frustration to have a dialogue around what are the cause asks things we can do to prevent this? mental health issues or accessibility to weapons and have, it's time to have a more national dialogue on these concerns. >> that is a conversation that is necessary. >> abc 7 news is producing a special hour long edition of world news with diane sawyer will air at 5:30, right after abc 7 news at 5:00. we'll bring you a special half hour edition of abc 7 news at 6:00. >> coming up next, here on abc 7 news at 4:00 dozens of firefighters on the job. new graduates of the fú1f8 fighter academy. >>

, all these parents were waiting for their children to come out. they'll thought they were, you know, still alive. there's 20 parents that were just told their children are dead. it was awful. >> awful. and late today, speaking for the nation but also as a father, an emotional president obama fought back tears. >> this evening, michelle and i will do what i know every parent in america will do, which is hug our children a little tighter and we'll tell them that we love them. and we'll remind each other how deeply we love one another. but there are families in connecticut who cannot do that tonight. and they need all of us right now. >> reporter: for more information about how you can help those affected, go to cnn.com/impact. so as the minutes tick by, the weight of the shooting tragedy got heavier and heavier. first, word of the shooting at the sandy hook elementary school, then the magnitude. reports 26 people killed, 20 of them children, ages 5 to 10 years old. news strong enough to knock the wind right out of you. and for many of us, it really,