Chicago ? They are coached to trust their instincts, to stand firm and say “no” when adults make them uncomfortable. Sometimes, they provide tips to the FBI to help find another who’s disappeared.

Even “Don’t talk to strangers,” the mantra of generations’ past, is out replaced with such sayings as “I am strong, smart and have a right to be safe.”

In an age when hundreds of thousands of children are reported missing each year, police and child advocates are looking more to young people to help themselves and their peers.

That’s true no matter why a child disappears. Last year, police and other law enforcement branches received about 725,000 missing child reports, the vast majority of them for runaways or children taken by a parent or other family member.

Rarest of all missing-child cases though often the most publicized are abductions by strangers, with 93 cases opened by the FBI last year.

Experts say children can be their own best defense though parents sometimes don’t teach them how.

Tina Schwartz, a spokeswoman for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, says parents need to talk openly and calmly to their children, “instilling the self confidence in them to say ‘no’ to an adult to scream, to always keep a friend with them, to always be aware of their personal safety.”

She also says children should learn that adults, particularly those they don’t know, shouldn’t be asking for a child’s help.

“Rehearse it with them. Ask them, ‘If someone came up and asked you to help them find a puppy, what would you do?”‘ Schultz says. Last month, a man who said he was looking for a lost puppy snatched 5-year-old Samantha Runnion from her Stanton, Calif., townhome complex and later killed her.

Samantha screamed and told a playmate who later described the kidnapper in precise detail to tell her grandmother. Authorities have arrested Alejandro Avila and charged him with the killing.