Every month, we practice emergency drills at International Language House to prepare us for any potential natural disasters that may occur during the school day.
Types of emergencies we have drills for are fires, earthquakes, and intruder drills. Everyone acts out the situation as if it were really happening. We allow the kids to feel fear or surprise in the moment since they may feel the same way during an actual disaster, but also encourage them to use courage despite what they may be feeling.
After going through with the simulation, we make sure every one knows the incident is over and have a talk with everyone. Teachers make comments about what went well and what we need to work on for future drills with the kids. We also review some important steps to emergency reactions:
No running!
No screaming or panicking!
Don’t go back inside the school after you’ve left!
If it’s a fire, don’t breathe in the smoke. If it’s an earthquake, put on your shoes and cover your head!
Once we review the rules, we are ready to return to our normal school day.
Every year in September, we conduct a simulation of a large earthquake similar to Kobe 1995 or Fukushima in 2011.
Kobe 1995 earthquake 
Fukushima 2011 earthquake/tsunami
On this day, we display a video of what those earthquakes looked like, talk about it, and hold a simulation.
When it’s time to go home, all parents must come to pick up their kids on foot. This is because if an actually big earthquake comes, the roads and train tracks will not be safe enough to ride on.
The more we practice for an emergency, the more prepared we will be in the future. Here’s to everyone’s safety moving forward!
International Language House Kindergarten blog 