Danger: Kappa Crossing!

It's a well known fact that kappa love to eat children and sometimes even pull them into the water and drown them for fun. To protect our children we can follow three simple steps.

1. If you meet a kappa, bow! Kappa are extremely polite and etiquette dictates that if bowed to they must reciprocate, and all the strength-giving water in the bowls on their head will pour out. They'll be too weak to be naughty and will have to go home! To avoid being eaten, children should learn to bow properly, and to be safe they should bow to everyone!
2. The only thing kappa love to eat more than children is cucumbers. Write your name and your children's on a cucumber and toss it into kappa-infested waters to mollify them.
3. Kappa hate loud noise and fire, so scare them away with fireworks! Have a firework festival every year and the kappa will be too afraid to come back.

Of course, if you're clever enough to trick a kappa into a promise (such as not eating you) their sense of decorum demands that they keep that promise, and you won't need to follow the three steps. Otherwise, have fun with fire, eat your cucumbers, and practice that bowing!