Literature for Adults to Assist Them in Helping Bereaved Children

The assignment sounded simple enough: “Describe, analyze, and evaluate literature available for adults to help them in their efforts to assist bereaved children.” Plodding into it, however, proved daunting. A Google search yielded 143,000 matches for “bereaved children” and 283,000 for “grieving children.” Reviews of death-related catalogs and books available through Amazon.com unveiled a dizzying array of options. Clearly, boundaries would need to be set. Having been instructed to include only written publications and not videos, DVDs, or other media, this is the question I opted to address: What are the “Top 20” publications for a professional wanting to start a library of written resources directed at adults who help grieving children? In my search, I enlisted the input of over 200 professionals and para-professionals in the field, in person (at the 7th Annual Children's Grief Symposium in San Antonio, Texas; among my colleagues at The Dougy Center, with a collective 40 years of work with bereaved children), and by e-mail (to selected members of the Association for Death Education and Counseling, and a gathering of Women in Thanatology). I filtered through their recommendations, and landed on the 20 listed here. I also decided to focus on two reading populations: professionals and parents. In so doing, I asked myself the following questions: What kinds of publications ought a person in a professional helping role, whether a psychologist, aftercare provider, counselor, therapist, or educator, be minimally familiar with to better assist bereaved children? And, what resources might those professionals recommend to individuals who are parenting children grieving a loss through death? You will note that I have excluded publications solely geared to classroom teachers or the school environment, not because they aren't important or voluminous, but because that topic is a full article in itself, and outside the scope of my assignment. Another qualifier: with the exceptions of co-editors, I chose to limit an author to one selection in order to broaden the range of topics and contributors. Caveat emptor

Grief · Medical education · Pedagogy · Political science · Professional development · Psychotherapist · Reading (process · Set (abstract data type · Thanatology · Grief, Bereavement, and Mental Health · History · Medicine · Migration, Health and Trauma · Psychology

• A literature review on bereavement and bereavement care

  Peter Wimpenny, Rachel Unwin et al.•Bereavement Care•2007

  Add to list

• Parents in Death-Related Literature for Children

  Open Access•Charles A Corr•OMEGA - Journal of Death and Dying•2007

  Add to list