This morning I was helping the first graders write postcards to their families from their virtual-by-way-of-study Australian adventures, and the fire alarm went off.
I was pretty sure it was not a scheduled drill, because first of all Mrs. H usually tells the adults in the room (including me!) if there is one planned, and second, she literally jumped out of her outdated hair-do when the extremely horribly very loud alarm went off right behind the two of us.
The littles were amazing. They stopped. They quieted. They stood and walked slowly. They lined up and filed out. We all walked excitedly but in orderly fashion (sshh!! SSHHH!!!) to the nearby field.
After we were standing and sitting in a quiet and orderly line for about five minutes, we saw the principal approach the teachers, and holyshit was she pissed!
Seems one of the children on the lower campus (all grades over K-1 are on the lower campus) pulled the fire alarm. OMFG YES IT IS TRUE! It was a prank. Apparently the first time it had happened 'accidentally' in almost ten years. Have I mentioned? This is a small mountain school.
This caused quite a stir. The children wanted to know who had done such a bad bad thing! (We didn't yet know, but the perp was soon to be revealed.)
Why would they do that? (many possible answers there; we reserved comment in favor of sharing the story of 'The Boy Who Cried Wolf'.)
We talked about the reasons why that was not a good trick to play.
One child told an elaborate story about how the fire department could not get to another house where someone's birthday cake had caught on fire and everyone perished while eating flaming cake or something thereof.
Point taken.
How would the principal know which child had pulled such a brazen stunt?
The teacher explained that there was dye on the handle of the fire alarm, and when it was pulled, the dye or ink would stain the person's hand and they would not be able to wash it off.
This tripped them out!
Would it ever come off? What color was it? What would the principal do? Would it ever come off?? Would it EVER COME OFF???
Suddenly, Amelia shouted,
"QUICK! EVERYONE! Look at your hands NOW! QUICK! CHECK YOUR HANDS!!!"
(Ummm...because...you never know where you might have been for the last ten minutes.)
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2 comments:
But who done it!
We had an actual fire in junior high, but our teacher refused to let us evacuate ("I don't have time for a fire drill! You have lessons to learn!") until it was clear that it was an actual emergency.
Then later, in college, we learned that to prevent fire-drill pranks, each residence hall to which the fire dept had to be dispatched would be fined $500 (payment distributed amongst the residents unless the "perp" fessed up) But we had an ACTUAL fire (caused by a problem with the wiring of a very old university-owned stove) and STILL had to pay. Of course I got annoyed at the fire marshal, asking him if perhaps the next time we had an actual fire that we shouldn't call the fire dept to avoid being fined?
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