Or is this inappropriate for a summer camp?

[Herewegoagain84]

My five year old has been going for a few days here and there over the summer to a day camp based at a school - well known company - seems to really enjoy it. This morning she mentioned that a few days ago they did “lockdown training” and she had to hide under a desk. She has been asking questions about what a lockdown is etc. We are in London.

Considering I don’t think this has been introduced in schools / we don’t have the same record as the US in this country, AIBU that this was an inappropriate “activity” to do with a group of five year olds? I want to call them to discuss it, as if they planned this I think it should have been brought to the attention of parents. If they did it as a game, I think that’s even weirder?

Wozers, do any of the children sleep at night?!

Seems odd to do it at a camp. If it's deemed essential life education then it should be done in school time so all children can participate.

It's not about general education. It's learning the procedures specific to that group / location. There will be some cross-over but the responses at the club might be different to school.

We do them in our nursery. We had to have 20 odd babies into 2 cupboards as our lockdown procedure. I’m grateful it’s in place and just hope we never need to use it

Our primary does them. Sometimes due to a fox or foxes walking outside of the classrooms.

As PP said, sadly it is normal in some London/inner-city areas.

A few years back I taught in a primary school where there were often drug raids/police chases on the estate by the school. We would hear police helicopters and see them right outside the windows. When a raid was happening, the police would call and the Headteacher would dial through to all classes via a tannoy system asking us to 'lockdown'. In this case, it usually meant to lock all doors and windows and carry on with the lesson. In one situation the suspect jumped over the playground rule and cut across school grounds to get away from police. We were then under desks hiding. Sadly, the children were pretty used to it and fairly unbothered.

This would happen around every two months.

"I don’t disagree that it’s appropriate in a school setting - this was a random one off day at summer camp with young inexperienced staff"

In that case it is even more important to have a plan in place. These "young inexperienced staff" may leave an entrance open which would be a safeguarding issue.

For all those clutching their pearls saying it is inappropriate and not needed, it takes just one incident that could be devastating.

How do you figure that?! It’s not a lockdown camp! She’s perfectly old enough for arts and crafts / outside games etc. I also didn’t say she was disturbed - just asking lots of questions as clearly it wasn’t handled well, and clearly from the response from the head office it wasn’t supposed to happen in any event.

Perfectly normal and natural for teenagers to go to cafes with friends. And younger than 16!

My DD has just left school, and I honestly have never even heard of ‘lockdown training’
When I first read your post I assumed it was to do with covid, lol!

But after reading a little more, I honestly don’t really see what the issue is.

I remember in primary school we used to do earthquake drills. Not really sure why, I remember quite a few earthquakes when I was a child, but it’s not like we live on a fault line like San Francisco!

Secondary teacher here, we've never done this at my school although we did get an email about it when we started doing covid vaccines and antivaxers were coming on site. Just asked my kids and this has never been done at their school either.

A fox? That seems a bit extreme to say the least, it's hardly a pack of wolves.😋

Is it typically a frequent activity as new children join the camp, as we are halfway through August now? You'd do it at the beginning of the summer if a one off surely?

We'd be in permanent lockdown if we did one every time we had a fox in the playground 🙈. They get out the way pretty sharp when a class of 30 odd noisy kids appear

They don’t do this at our primary school, had no idea it was done anywhere in the UK

I'm shocked that there are people here who say their schools DON'T do it. So would you know what to do if a lone gunman was in the school? Would you know to lock the door, to keep kids out of sight, to wait for on screen communication from the co-ordinator? To pull down blinds and cover glass in the classroom door etc?

Same here Vetiver, never heard of it.

Yes age appropriate lockdown drills like this one ( there’s a fierce dog outside) are normal - but I would have expected the holiday club to have advised you and perhaps even shown you the lesson plan and info as parents.

It’s dfe guidance that all schools have lockdown arrangements in place and practice them .

in our LA about 5 years ago we trained all our schools with someone from the Police Anti Terrorism team presenting/advising.

To all of you calling lockdown drill unnecessary, just one word: Dunblane.

And all of you saying it's not appropriate for a summer camp: Brevik and Utøya.

It's not nice, but it's necessary. We've been doing this with our students for a couple of years now, having had training from PREVENT police officers.

Cross posted with you @AngelfishDecay !

Exactly this! I don't even work in a school but in a privately owned setting with young people and we do this!

Well that all seems like common sense to me, so yes I'd probably do that

Why do parents need to be informed it's happening? There are no letters home to say there will be a fire drill in the first few weeks back in September, but there will be.

In fact, in order to keep the 'drill' element useful, prior warning isn't typically given to anyone, but arranged only between senior staff. It's partly to test if teachers can clear their departments effectively and admin staff are on top of accurate registers, as well as the children walking to the correct meeting points.

My understanding is that this is a policy that schools have to have now - primary as well as secondary . Not sure in fact why you would think that secondary school children need to be protected but not primary school children? And of course children in a school need to know what to do in this emergency so would have to practise.

It makes an awful lot of sense to me that if this is a risk to be considered during the school term, the same risk is there for a holiday club. The children don't need to be told in details what the risks actually are - just what the instructions are they have to follow when the emergency sounds . A bit like a fire drill .

Well I'm glad YOU would do that, but how many kids would know what they needed to do?! Common sense is not really what they're known for.