Birdie’s Tree
Growing together through natural disasters

Welcome to Birdie’s Tree! Natural disasters like storms, cyclones, floods or fire can be very frightening and upsetting for babies and young children. Playing a therapeutic game or reading a story with a caring adult can help a young child work through the scary experiences and ‘big feelings’. There’s information for parents and carers too. Come and meet Birdie and Mr Frog!

Resources

Further support

General

– Your local doctor (General Practitioner)
– Lifeline (24 hrs) 13 11 14
– 13 Health 13 432 584
– beyondblue info line 1300 224 636
– Relationships Australia 1300 364 277

Adults

– PANDA (Perinatal Anxiety and Depression Australia) 1300 726 306
– Women’s Health Queensland Wide Inc. (07) 3216 0376 (outside Brisbane) 1800 017 676
– Pregnancy, Birth and Baby Helpline (24 hrs) 1800 882 436
– Mensline Australia (24 hrs) 1300 789 978

Children

– Local Child and Youth/ Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service
– Parent Line (8am – 10pm daily) 1300 301 300
– Kids Helpline (24 hrs) 1800 551 800

For Early Childhood Education and Care Professionals

Recovering after disaster resource guide

Are you working in early childhood education and care with young children and families who’ve been through a natural disaster? Have children in your centre been affected by a natural disaster through family, friends, or media reporting? Would you like staff and children in your centre to be emotionally prepared for such events in the future?

The Birdie’s Tree Early Childhood Curriculum helps young children cope with severe weather and natural disasters. The whole-of-centre approach builds children’s resilience by increasing their emotional literacy and strengthening their sense of social connection. Where children have been affected by a natural disaster, the curriculum aids recovery by helping children work through their experiences, and the ‘big feelings’ such events can cause. The curriculum also includes elements to educator to take care of their own emotional wellbeing through stressful events.

The curriculum is available through a package of centre-wide training, resources and support.

Register your centre’s interest in accessing the curriculum

Name of early childhood centre*
Name of group or network
Contact person's name*
Email*
Phone*
Mailing address
Street address (if different from mailing address)
Approximate number of staff
Natural disaster affecting the area (if applicable)
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About Birdie’s Tree

Queensland Centre for Perinatal and Infant Mental Health acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the land. We pay our respects to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Elders past, present and emerging.

Birdie’s Tree has been designed to support the mental health and emotional wellbeing of babies and young children, their parents and families, in relation to severe weather events and other natural disasters. The resources are helpful in the ‘preparedness’ phase (before a natural disaster happens), during the ‘response’ phase (while an event is happening) and in the ‘recovery’ phase (after an event has occurred).

Birdie’s Tree has been developed by the Queensland Centre for Perinatal and Infant Mental Health (QCPIMH), Queensland’s statewide hub of expertise in the mental health and emotional wellbeing of expectant and new parents, babies and young children. QCPIMH is a Queensland Government service hosted by Children’s Health Queensland Hospital and Health Service.

Order professionally-printed hard copies of the Birdie storybooks