We Care Elementary: Healthy
Relationships Project

We Care Elementary is a developmentally targeted, trauma- informed sexual abuse prevention program created by Prevent Child Abuse Vermont for elementary school communities. We Care Elementary focuses on building children’s healthy relationship skills through multimodal, highly experiential lessons for children in grades 3-5.  Children in this age range have robust set of developmental tasks. Children develop awareness of self as well as of peers and social groups. With this newfound awareness comes the capacity for empathy and establishing their ideas about how to be in the world and how to treat others. Physiologically, older children are approaching puberty and beginning to wonder about sexual development. All of these factors make sexual abuse prevention especially timely for this age group and also make it especially important that the content is delivered in a developmentally appropriate way.

The We Care Elementary curriculum includes six lessons at each grade level. Each grade focuses on different topics related to healthy relationships and that address the risk and protective factors related to victimization and perpetration. We Care Elementary capitalizes on children’s capacity for generalizing information and reflecting on their emotions and experiences.

For more information, contact: Christine@washtenawchildren.org