Lockdown drills have become commonplace in Australian schools at both primary and secondary levels.
As an ex teacher, I understand why these drills exist and believe it is important to have safety procedures and practice runs of these procedures for a range of different situations.
But there is an issue, and it is a substantial one. Not every student or staff member within schools find these drills simple and procedural, or helpful.
There are some that are legitimately emotionally and psychologically impacted by them, and I have witnessed this first-hand.
Why Gabbie Stroud Broke Up With Teaching. Post continues below.
So, what exactly are lockdown drills?
Similar to fire drills, their intention is to prepare students and staff in a school with the safety protocols and routines of a specific emergency scenario.
Like fire drills, they are never announced, so the majority of staff and students are never 100 per cent sure whether it’s a practice or the real thing.
Lockdowns are usually used if there is an intruder or dangerous individual on the school ground, a threat being made against students or the school, an act of violence on the school grounds or an act of terrorism.
In most cases, the lockdown is announced via the P.A system with the words lockdown repeated, as well as a siren, every ten seconds.
This is done on a loop for about one minute, accompanied by an announcement that declares whether it is a drill and the communication of which specific threat it is.
Lockdown plans vary from institution to institution, but the Victorian education website says they can include the following procedures: directing children to seek shelter, pulling down blinds and switching off lights and electronics, remaining silent and encouraging students to do so, and advising staff and students to hide where they will avoid detection from outside the room.
Throughout my secondary school teaching career we conducted both of these mandatory types of drills. The fire drills usually ran quite smoothly, but lockdowns were different.
Although most of my teenage students followed instructions and were unaffected by them, some found the procedure more challenging for various reasons.
Some groups of students didn’t take the drill seriously and refused to take part. For them the safety procedure was ‘uncool’ and would never happen in reality, so why should they bother embarrassing themselves?
Then there were the students who thought it was a game. To them it was funny because they also thought it was never going to really happen. They would make jokes about shooting the intruder and reference different weapons they would use, making sounds of guns firing while laughing.
For myself as a teacher, it was another group of students I found the hardest to witness go through the drill. Over the four lockdowns I experienced when I was teaching, around eight students found them frightening, anxiety-inducing and quite emotional.
Some felt this way because they didn’t know whether it was a drill or actually happening, and this uncertainty was quite confronting for them.
The nature of lockdowns and fire drills - in order to make them as realistic as possible - is that the majority of school staff (myself included) are not informed of this either, so there is little to be done to comfort these students.
Others had backgrounds of family violence and issues with anxiety which meant this specific drill was in their mind very real, or at least it reminded them of past events which could be a trigger for them.
This emotional effect of lockdown drills isn’t uncommon. In America, a study of US schools found the drills caused a heightened level of anxiety in school children, who would subsequently display side effects like nail biting, crying and wetting their pants at the time of the drill and afterward. Many also had nightmares in the nights and weeks following.
These findings were similar to what I witnessed in some of the students who found the lockdowns confronting. There were times where some would cry, retreat within themselves and there was one who physically trembled while the lockdown drill was taking place.
While I understand the reasoning in making the drills realistic and believable, I also understand they can be potentially harmful for groups of students and staff that for whatever reason aren’t as equipped to deal with this as well as others. And I question whether it is fair for them to have to endure them.
Perhaps it's time to think of alternative options that can both protect our children from potential threats but also the potential psychological and emotional harm of the drill itself.
Shona Hendley, ‘Mother of Cats, Goats and Humans’ is a freelance writer from Victoria. An ex secondary school teacher, Shona has a strong interest in education and is a passionate animal advocate. You can follow her on Instagram.
Do you agree with the need for a different system to prepare students for dangerous situations? Let us know your thoughts in the comments.
Top Comments
When we do lockdown drills with our students we tell them as it starts that it is only a drill but they need to take it as seriously as possible. Students who have been detrimentally affected by lockdowns, both real and drill, are told at least a day before so that they are able to find a safe haven when the drill begins with a trusted teacher. Even the students who have PTSD from experiencing school shootings from their time in the USA are then able to cope.
Perfect! Amazing what some common sense can do in a situation like this!
One might argue that it's the children emotionally and psychologically unprepared for a lockdown that need the drills the most...? The whole point, after all, is to make the procedure as familiar and smooth as possible, because the reality will be so much more intense. When the lockdown drills expose certain behaviours in kids, perhaps the answer isn't to dismiss or change the practice of the drills themselves, but to give these kids copying strategies to better handle each drill/ crisis.
But I would be interested to know the author's thoughts on what would be an appropriate alternative to lockdown drills.
I'm interested to see what the author has an alternative as well. My daughter has experiences lock downs in response to a violent adult being on the grounds who could of posed a risk to children and teachers.
Except if the kids don’t know if it’s real or a drill, then the practise situation is exactly as intense as the ‘real’ one. And there’s only the tiniest chance that these drills will ever be needed, so is it worth traumatising thousands of kids on the off chance that it is useful one day? In a country with zero school shooting a year it is definitely debatable, and it seems reasonable to at least tell the students if it’s a real or practise alarm. Besides, if you don’t tell them when it’s a drill then chances are in a real emergency, half the class will think it’s not important.
Everyone can see what’s going on with hazardous weather though, it’s not exactly a ‘lockdown’ in the sense that alarms go off and you barricade the door, it’s much more likely an announcement. And yeah I guess intruders are an issue but again, all of these procedures are geared towards the situation where they have a gun or another weapon. In the current world situation kids are going to be thinking about a school shooting when those alarms go off. And in any of these cases there’s no reason that the kids can’t know it’s a drill to save them the trauma of expecting to be shot.