Deployment Videos for Kids: What to Record Before You Leave and the Free Ones Worth Watching

For preschoolers, the free Dear Elmo videos from Sesame Street for Military Families are the best ready-made option, and for kids of every age the best video is one of you. The Deployments collection includes Dear Elmo: Getting Ready, Dear Elmo: Connecting, For Families: Deployment Story and the songs Here for You and Proud, plus printables such as Faces and Feelings. Sesame Workshop says these resources are free to families and come in English and Spanish (Sesame Workshop, 2023).

United Through Reading handles the books. The nonprofit was formed in 1989 by Betty J. Mohlenbrock, a military spouse, mother and teacher (U.S. Army, 2011), and says it has reached over 4.4 million military family members and recorded over 600,000 stories as of October 2026.

Verdict: use United Through Reading for books and your phone for everything else, show the Dear Elmo videos to anyone under 6, and build a Persona for the questions no recording can predict. Our guide to recordable storybooks compares the books a toddler can hold.

Videos keep the deployed parent inside the child's ordinary day, which is what the major military family programs recommend. The MCEC deployment booklet tells parents to record themselves reading bedtime stories and singing favorite songs, and calls those recordings treasured resources while you are away (MCEC, 2003). The AAP says kids thrive on routines and suggests keepsakes such as a stuffed animal or a T-shirt with the deployed parent's photo (AAP, HealthyChildren.org, 2019). Military OneSource tells deploying parents to warn kids that some days will pass without contact (Military OneSource, 2024), and a recorded video fills those days whether or not you called.

Record four kinds of video before you leave: read-alouds, routines, everyday messages and answers to the questions your kids will ask. Read-alouds get most of the attention, but the other three make the house feel like you are still in it. MCEC warns that the predeployment period can last several weeks or just a few hours (MCEC, 2003), so work from the top of each list down.

Read-alouds

• Their favorite picture books, read the way you always read them, silly voices included.

• A chapter book for older kids, one chapter per video, so there is always a next episode.

• Your child's name at the start of each video, with the cover held up to the camera.

Routines

• Your bedtime song or prayer, and the goodnight line you always say.

• A school-morning video and a first-day-of-school message.

• How you make Saturday pancakes or tie a double knot.

Everyday messages

• "I'm proud of you" videos for a good test, a lost tooth or game day.

• A "listen to Mom" or "listen to Dad" video for nights the at-home parent needs backup.

• A bad-day video and a sick-day video, in the spirit of open-when letters.

• Birthday and holiday messages labeled for the day they should play, like letters to open on future birthdays.

Answers to the questions they will ask

• Where are you going, and why do you have to go?

• When are you coming home? Give a season, not a date.

• Are you safe? Do you miss me? Who is in charge now?

• Can I still talk to you, and what happens if you do not answer?

Film in landscape at eye level near a window, and keep most videos under five minutes so a toddler makes it to the end. Label every file with who it is for and when to play it, such as "Maya, first day of second grade." Our guide to leaving videos for your children has more ideas.

Even a long list of recorded answers leaves gaps, because your seven-year-old will ask the twenty-first question at dinner: what your first car was, whether you were scared of the dark, how you met Mom. If those stories are in your Persona, your Persona can tell them in your words and your own cloned voice, which makes this list the starting set of memories for your Persona.

Match the idea to what your child can understand: babies need your voice, toddlers need a countdown they can touch, school-age kids need a job, and teens need privacy and a real say. The reactions column comes from the AAP (HealthyChildren.org, 2019), and the paper chain, the Hershey's Kisses and the packing job come from MCEC and Military OneSource.

Give the week a fixed shape so your kids know what comes next, and treat live calls as a bonus rather than the plan. Military OneSource tells the parent at home to keep the usual schedule and add routines for care packages and letters (Military OneSource, 2024). Here is an example week for a family with a preschooler and a second grader.

Example: how many books to record. A seven-month deployment is about 30 weeks. Two read-aloud nights a week makes 60 bedtime slots, so 20 recorded books covers the whole deployment with each book playing three times. At about eight minutes per picture book, that is under three hours of recording, or two evenings on the couch. The weekly routine costs the at-home parent about an hour and a half across seven nights.

Install the free United Through Reading app, verify through Troop ID from ID.me, and record yourself reading on video; your family then watches on demand or downloads the video for offline viewing. The app is open to active-duty service members, veterans and their families. The nonprofit also runs Story Stations at military installations if you would rather use a ready-made setup.

1. Install the app and register through Troop ID from ID.me.

2. Choose the book. Your child's own copy is best, and the app also has an ebook library.

3. Record, offline if you need to. The app uploads when you are back on Wi-Fi, which helps on a ship or a remote base.

4. Your family watches on demand or offline.

5. Request the free copy of the book you read so your child can turn the pages with you. The App Store listing credits the Dollar General Literacy Foundation for the books.

Best for: bedtime reading at any age. The weak spot is the ebook shelf: the app holds 3.8 stars from 20 ratings on the App Store as of October 2026, and reviewers say the selection is small, so read from your child's own favorites.

Build your Persona on Afterlife.ai™ before you leave, from your own memories, stories and voice, and add your spouse or the kids' caregiver as a Trusted Contact. Your kids can then ask your Persona questions and hear the answers in your own cloned voice, even in weeks when you have no signal at all. Our guide to an AI version of me for my kids covers how kids use a Persona day to day.

1. Sign up free in the iPhone or Android app or at app.afterlife.ai. One account works on all three, in 42 languages.

2. Create your voice. Creating your voice is free, your first listen is free, and your Persona speaks in your own cloned voice. Our guide on how to clone your voice covers getting a clean recording.

3. Add your first 25 memories: the stories your kids always ask for, how you met their other parent, your first car, your rules for life. Start with the questions list above, then borrow from what your child will want to ask you at thirty.

4. Add up to 5 Trusted Contacts on the free build, such as your spouse, the grandparents or whoever runs bedtime while you are gone.

5. Record one 30-second video for Persona Video, so your kids can get video messages of you in your face and your own voice. Your first Persona Video is free.

6. Do a test run: let the kids ask your Persona three questions while you are in the room, so the first conversation happens with you beside them.

You own your Persona and make every decision about what goes in. Under 18s cannot build a Persona, but your kids can help you choose the stories, which makes a good afternoon together before you go. See how to preserve your voice for your family for more on keeping your voice in the family.

The free build never expires: 25 memories, up to 5 Trusted Contacts and Executor Lock™ setup, with no card. When you want more, Legacy is US$14.99 a month and Eternal is US$29.99 a month (see our pricing page). Example: Legacy for a full seven-month deployment comes to about US$105, less than three Hallmark recordable storybooks.

Leave out operational details, exact homecoming dates and anything that sounds like a farewell, because kids may replay these videos dozens of times. Watch each video back before you hand it over, and re-record any that include the items below.

• Locations, unit details and dates. Follow your command's operations security (OPSEC) guidance, because a cute clip can end up on a relative's public social media page.

• A fixed homecoming date. Give a season instead. If the return date changes, MCEC advises adjusting the countdown when the child is not around (MCEC, 2003).

• Promises you may not keep. Promise a call every night and the first missed call becomes a hard night, so promise videos and letters instead.

• Adult jobs for kids. Do not tell a nine-year-old he is the man of the house. The AAP already counts new household responsibilities among the pressures on teens (AAP, 2019), so thank kids for helping instead.

• Long goodbyes. Military OneSource recommends brief goodbyes (Military OneSource, 2024), and the same goes for video.

For the paperwork side, our checklist of what to leave your family before you deploy goes item by item.

Get help when a child's behavior seems extreme, goes on for a long time or gets worse instead of better, or when your child is very anxious about the deployed parent's safety; those are the AAP's warning signs (AAP, HealthyChildren.org, 2019). Military OneSource offers free, confidential counseling at 800-342-9647 (Military OneSource, 2024). Family counseling covers children ages 6 to 12 with a parent present, and teens ages 13 to 17 can take part if a parent is present at the start of each session.

Military and Family Life Counselors (MFLCs) and chaplains are other good options, and MFLCs can support children under 18 with written consent from a parent (Military OneSource, 2024). Your child's pediatrician is a good first call for stomachaches, sleep trouble or regression. Brief teachers and coaches before you leave, because MCEC notes that teachers are often the first to notice changes in behavior or schoolwork (MCEC, 2003).

• United Through Reading: Storytime for military families

• Apple App Store: United Through Reading app listing

• Sesame Street for Military Families: Deployments

• Sesame Workshop: New Resources to Support Family and Community Bonds for Military Families (2023)

• Military OneSource: Preparing Your Children for Deployment (2024)

• American Academy of Pediatrics, HealthyChildren.org: Effects of Deployment on Children and Families (2019)

• Military Child Education Coalition: How to Prepare Our Children and Stay Involved in Their Education During Deployment (2003)

• Department of Defense via Military OneSource: 2023 Demographic Profile, Active-Duty Families

• U.S. Army: Read-aloud DVDs help families ease deployment stress (2011)

• Hug-A-Hero: Photo dolls for military kids

• Hallmark: Wherever You Are My Love Will Find You Recordable Storybook