When Should a Child Learn First Aid?

So when should a child learn first aid? From my own experience with my children, I would say that it depends on the maturity of the child. That said, my youngest is six and she is having a blast learning. In her case, she has two older brothers and she is a competitive soul.

But she is picking it up really nicely. A few weeks ago I posted a short video to my family and friends showing my kids having fun applying a bandage and a tourniquet (and for a final test using some surprise moulage and vampire blood to ratchet up a bit of tension). The interesting comments in response to that video from family and friends prompted me to ask this community what they thought about teaching children first aid. And again, I was pleasantly surprised at the feed back and would really like to thank the folks who responded to the question, it was really useful

So while I have had various med courses throughout my career and I feel comfortable teaching my own children, I turned to my good friend Roddy who is also a retired operations officer but who also spent a good number of years as a medical professional in the military and the government to discuss the possibility of doing more. Roddy is a phenomenal teacher and he has broken just about every bone in his body at one point or another (somewhat of a walking medical miracle if I do say so myself) and so he brings a unique perspective to the game. Anyway we decided to put together some instructional videos for kids from ages six through the early teens. In addition, we plan to offer live training for kids and families. Between Roddy and I, we have eight kids, so we want to hedge our bets in the event one of our kids might become a first responder in our own home...

Here is a short video trailer that outlines our intent. This training effort is still a work in progress, but if you are interested in live training and live in the Hampton Roads/Newport News/Williamsburg/Richmond area, let me know. Under certain circumstances, we might be able to entertain training elsewhere, but in the vernacular of intelligence training, "it depends." In the meantime, our conclusion is that it is never too early to start teaching children first aid.