Elizabeth Shoaf Talks about Escape from Abductor

Elizabeth Shoaf talked on the Today Show on Friday about her 2006 kidnapping. CNN details the story about Shoaf's kidnapping and her 10-day ordeal. Shoaf managed to get her captor's cell phone and send her mother a text message. Shoaf said she was scared to escape before that because her captor told her that the bunker was rigged with explosive booby traps. Shoaf's parents talk about how she stayed smart and it helped her.

As parents it is so important to teach our kids ow to stay safe. Here are some tips to help keep kids and teens safe when walking home from school.

1. Stay together. Numbers are always your friend. If you are a young child or a teen that walks home from school it is always better if you can stay in a group. If you can form a group of walking buddies. This is important because it helps the kids become less of a target to predators. Also if anything does happen to one of the kids, there are other kids that know what happened.

2. Scream! This sounds obvious but sometimes kids or teens can worry about if they are misjudging the situation, or if they will look or sound silly if they start screaming. By screaming you will hopefully attract the attention of someone who can see what is happening and can help. Also be sure to teach kids not to just scream because some people might ignore it, scream things like "help", "help this person is kidnapping me", "help, I don't know this person" or even "help, fire" anything to get someones attention.

3. Fight! I know this is another obvious one, but sometimes teens or young kids can be worried about drawing attention to themselves. It is important to tell kids to make fuss if something is happening to them. They just might shock the abductor and be able to get away. I'm not saying they should chance their lives if someone has a weapon, but often you have a much better chance of getting away from someone at the original scene then from the secluded place that the abductor might be taking you.

4. Carry a cell phone. I know this isn't possible for everyone, and this is geared mainly to older kids. If you do have a cell phone call 911 on it right away. If something happens, you can even just leave the phone on without talking. The 911 operator is trained for situations like this, they should be able to listen and know what is going on. Hopefully this will get help sent to you right away. The other good thing about a cell phone is it can be traced with GPS, so often it can lead people to where you are.

5. Trust your instinct. I really think this is the most important one. You need to teach your kids and teens to trust what they are feeling. So many times we have a bad feeling about a certain person or a situation, but we ignore it. If you are feeling weird about a situation it is probably for a good reason, and you shouldn't ignore your feelings. Don't worry about feeling dumb or silly. If you don't feel comfortable in a situation, you probably shouldn't be there. Teaching kids to trust their instincts is very important.