Several months ago the fire alarm went off near the end of church and everyone was a bit baffled but safely got out. This was when I was still teaching the bigger kids. We had no plan in place so we just went out the nearest exit, but stayed on the grass right next to the building, and then parents quickly found us and started taking kids home. It was a little chaotic and very disorganized. Kids were running all over and it was hard to keep a good head count of who had been picked up already. Thankfully when the firemen came they confirmed that it was a false alarm!
After that incidence, it was very clear that as a ward we were in dire need of an evacuation plan and a fire drill!
I was soon after put into Nursery. The following is the plan that I came up with. I gave a copy to the primary president, every Nursery family, and posted one on our door.
We eventually had a fire drill and it went well. Taking everyone across the parking lot to the big grassy field and covered pavilion was an obvious good idea that Bishop decided on.
After our lesson and music time, we always take the kids over to this grass or to an empty portion of the cultural hall to run and play for a few minutes. So it wasn't hard for them to cooperate when the fire drill happened. But still, us leaders knew it was going to happen so it wasn't necessarily a perfect test of our abilities and our kiddos.
Well, we got a good test this time! Thankfully it was another false alarm, but we didn't know that!
The alarm went off while we were playing in the cultural hall. The ladies that I have privilege of serving with were fantastic! One immediately jumped up and ran back to our room to grab the rope we use to herd them across the parking lot. The other sister was a super star at getting the kids gathered up and holding onto the rope. This was no easy feat considering they were all spread out and in the middle of playing with strollers and tunnels.
I'm also grateful for and impressed with the other adults who came to our aid! The Primary music leader and two dads were right there when we opened the door to begin our walk through the building. And we made it through the main doors of the church without any little ones being squished or stepped on.
I'm super proud of these kiddos, too! This was a major shift in our rigid schedule! We never go outside after first going to play in the "big room;" it's always either one or the other. Then of course one might expect some crying induced by the scary flashing lights and loud siren, not to mention the possible meltdowns when they're told without warning to drop their toys and go somewhere else! And almost all of them held onto the rope the whole time, as instructed.
In the end, we successfully got 12 children age 18 months to 3 years old across the parking lot and linked up with their parents without incident!
Hopefully we don't have any more false alarms and no real fires either! But if we do, I'm pretty confident we'll be able to handle it!
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