Planning a Fire Safety Night for Your Family

Some tips for planning a Fire Safety Night for your family

• Print out our Fire Safety Booklet that includes a page to make your own fire escape plan. (CLICK HERE to download Fire Safety Booklet).
• As a family, plan two ways out of each room in the house.
• Color the printable sheets and talk about fire safety (see list below).
• Play a two-minute song and practice getting out of the house before it ends.
• The Beatles’ “I’m Happy Just to Dance with You” is 01:53 long.
• Using a stopwatch, have the kids time each other getting out of the house.
• As a family, choose a meeting place out in front of the house. Make it easy to access and recognizable to each member of the family.
• Let one of the kids set off the alarm to help the family practice getting out.
• Teach kids how to use fire escape ladders, if they need to escape from a second-story window.

Talk to Your Kids About Fire Safety

• Most home fires start in the bedroom. If you have candles, incense, or other flammables in bedrooms, talk to kids about keeping them away from curtains, bedding, or anything else.
• Talk to your kids about playing with matches, lighters, candles, fireworks, or other flammables. These should only be used with careful adult supervision. 
• While most irons have an automatic safety shut-off feature, not all do. Teach kids to always turn off curling irons, straighteners, clothes irons, etc.
• Talk to your kids about what to do if there is a fire in the kitchen. 
• In the event of a grease fire, show kids how to cover the pan to put it out. Do not transport the fire to the sink. Do not run water over it. 
• Show kids where the home fire extinguishers are located and how to use them in case of emergency. 
• If clothes catch on fire, teach your kids to stop, drop, and roll.
• Practice stopping, dropping, and rolling together as a family. It might be fun to practice on a grassy hill the kids can roll down. 
• Teach kids to stay away from open flames, such as fireplaces, wood burning stoves, the ignitions of furnaces or gas heaters, etc.

Do a Home Safety Check

• Check to make sure there aren’t overloaded outlets
• Check to see if any outlets are warm to the touch, or discolored. If you have questions about whether your outlets are safe, contact an electrician. 
• Make sure you aren’t using extension cords in permanent applications
• Keep all space heaters away from furniture, clothing, bedding, and anything else
• Identify any areas that might be fire hazards
• Point out where gasoline, lighter fluid, or other flammable liquids are stored and teach kids to exercise caution around those items
• Parents: consider staging certain hazards in the house and see if the kids can identify them.

When Performing a Family Fire Drill

1. Have family members begin in separate rooms of the house.
2. Activate the smoke detector by pushing the TEST button. This way, everyone knows what the sound is and what it means.
3. Have children make sure to touch doorknobs and doors to see if they’re warm. If the door is warm, DO NOT open the door!
4. Make sure no one takes anything with them, looks for anything, or goes back into the house. (Parents: consider a fireproof safe to keep all important documents and keepsakes in so you don’t have to worry about these.)
5. Have everyone move quickly out of the house.
6. Close all doors behind you as you exit.
7. Gather at the family meeting place. 
8. Practice the drill as many times as you need to in order to get it under two minutes. 
9. Once you have a plan, practice it at least once a year.