To think it's very depressing that school children need to learn this

re Dunblane. I am Australian and my dad was a headteacher in Melbourne. When Dunblane happened- it was such an earthquake level event. Such shock. Such grief. I remember my dad watching the news and shaking and then collapsing to the ground at the sheer horror of it. And we were on the other side of the world. Then only a few weeks later the Port Arthur massacre.

Awful things happen. We can't think we are in this lovely little bubble where it only happens to other people. Southport shows us that surely.

Guidance has been to do it since 2017 so not new new

Yes that was horrific. Then followed by the man who attacked a nursery with a machete a few months later.

Makes a change from the stray dog threat scenario!

There has been a series of malicious calls to lots of schools the past few weeks near me. Thankfully not my child's school but I know of multiple that have had to go into lockdown because of it.
For several of the primary schools the children seemingly didn't notice it as the teachers were so good at not panicking. Obviously at secondary they are more aware that what they are doing is unusual.

Their lockdown didn't involve cowering under desks, just moving everyone to elsewhere in the school.

Nicholas Procter planned to murder 34 children and two teachers at his former primary school in Luton last year, after he'd killed his mother, brother and sister. I'd say it's fairly self evident why drills are necessary.

I know, was being ironic!

DS genuinely didn’t realise what the lockdown drill was really for.

I really hope they don't use this particular euphemism at my DCs school. He's already afraid of dogs and the suggestion that they might have a killer dog attack at school would be terrifying.

We live in a cruel world. Look at the horrendous Dunblame school shooting in 1996. Absolutely Heartbreaking.

It’s positive that schools now mitigate and take measures. It’s still extremely unlikely to happen and such terror attacks haven’t happened in UK schools since Dunblane thankfully.

The wild dog one is the lockdown drill

DS’s school definitely doesn’t do lockdown drills.

Just fire drills and practises of what to do if a wild dog gets into the school.

Depressing but necessary unfortunately.

I live in the US (temporarily thank god!) and active shooter drills are common place in my kids’ school - they are primary school age.

As much as it’s commonplace, doesn’t mean it’s any easier to digest. My heart fell out of my arse when my 8 year old DS told me he has his own “special hiding place” under his coat and backpack.
Any items of clothing that light up or make noise - like the flashing trainers we all loved as kids - are banned from school because they give away your location in the event of an active shooter 😔
It makes me feel sick. But at the same time, it’s necessary.
If the government won’t do more to protect our children from lunatics, then they need to know how to keep themselves safe if the situation did arise.

There is no other point.
The world is terrible, yes. Schools are keeping kids safe - excellent.

Then their kids just didn’t tell them.
At primary it is described as ‘if an animal gets into school etc’.

Of course it’s sad that the world is not perfectly safe, but I’m grateful schools do this.
Different mindset.

This hits close to home.

I'm from Germany and in 2009 I visited a friend who received mental health treatment in a hospital. On that day a horrible school shooting happened only a few hundred metres away from the hospital and the whole town, including the hospital, went into lockdown for several hours.

Many children, teachers and pedestrians that were unlucky to come across the shooter as he was fleeing lost their life on this day:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winnenden_school_shooting

I still am traumatised to this day by what happened.

It's very rare for this to happen, but I was, although indirectly, affected by it.

I think it's good that schools do drills in case there is an intruder. It's best to be prepared.

It's probably already been said but we used to have tons of bomb scares at school in the late 60s? /early 70s. As a kid you kind of just get on with it after the first couple.

When I was a kid, I went to British forces schools in Germany. We had school security procedures and anti terrorism policies. Indeed, a kid lost their bag and when it got found it got destroyed by the bomb disposal squad (in case someone dodgy put a bomb in it).

Think of it like a fire drill. All schools do these, but very few have to evacuate due to a real fire.

Lived near Broadmoor when I was young - had drills at school, lived in fear of the siren going off. Not sure if it still goes off at 10am on a Monday morning.
My kids have lockdown drills at school, doesn’t seem to bother them. Unfortunately guns are increasingly easy to get hold of in the UK

Yes, I agree its disturbing we need to to this. I feel that something is seriously wrong with our society.
( I think G. Neufeld, the psychologist, has explained why)

Exactly, I reckon plenty of people saying “my child’s school don’t do it” are just oblivious, and it is actually happening. Often kids don’t think anything of it so don’t mention at home, and the school doesn’t communicate it to parents, either.

Jewish schools have US-style gunman practices all the time.

Other schools don’t expect gunman but it’s good to have kids prepared for incidents as a learning point anyway and are more likely to have an angry dad etc

My DC was locked down last year (year 7). Unfortunately, she witnessed the intruders. When she said they had to make themselves into a little ball under their desks, I really felt for her. She said she felt cold and she was shivering (I think she was nervous) and the intruders had balaclavas on. They were arrested.
Its can be a horrible world.

How often are UK schools evacuated due to a swarm of bees or escaped zoo animal? It needs to be proportionate in order not to frighten the children - there's enough school anxiety as it is. Teaching them how to respond to the fire alarm and some basic first aid is a good idea and applicable to situations outside of school.

I’m in Southport, we didn’t think anything would happen here until it did