Children, Adolescents, and Death

Children, Adolescents, and Death provides information that can be used to address the death-related questions from children and adolescents. It also looks at questions from caring adults about the way children or adolescents view death and the grief that follows a death or any major loss.

Robert G. Stevenson is senior professor in the graduate counseling program of Mercy College in New York and a recipient of the New York State Defense of Freedom Medal. He developed the first independent course on death education at the high-school level and taught it for 25 years. Gerry R. Cox is professor emeritus of sociology/archaeology at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse, former director of the Center for Death Education & Bioethics, and a member of the board of directors of the National Prison Hospice Association.

Section 1: Knowledge of Death. 1. Children and Death: What Do They Know and When Do They Learn It? Robert G. Stevenson 2. Death vs. 2014: How Children and Adolescents are Learning and Grieving in Cyberspace Illene Noppe Cupit and Olyvia Kuchta 3. The Disenfranchised Grief of Children and Adolescents Kenneth J. Doka 4 Trauma and Grief in Early Life: A Model for Supporting Children, Adolescents, and Their Families Dianne McKissock 5. Family Therapy and Traumatic Losses Stephanie Rabenstein and Darcy Harris Section 2: Coping with Death at Home and at School 6. Children and Death: Coping through Humor, Art, and Music Gerry Cox 7. "Oh, Those Poor Children!": Borrowing Historical and Biographical Loss Narratives of Grieving Children Harold Ivan Smith 8. Child Development: An Existential Journey Neil Thompson 9. Children, Adolescents, and Catastrophic Loss: The Role of Spiritual Care Peter Ford 10. Helping Bereaved Children in the Schools Linda Goldman 11. A School Counselor's Role in Bereavement Counseling Arthur McCann Section 3: Death and the Family 12. Seasons of Love: Measuring a Child's Life After Suicide Janet S. McCord and Rebecca S. Morse 13. Dealing with Loss and Grief of Minority Children in an Urban Setting Fernando Cabrera and Robert Stevenson 14. When a Grandparent Dies Richard Gilbert 15. Difficult Conversations: Children, Adolescents, and Death Carolyn Cullen 16. The Presence of Absence: The Struggle for Meaning in the Death of a Child Robert A. Neimeyer and Wendy G. Lichtenthal Appendix: Questions and Answers