Pandemonium

Something very disturbing happened to me yesterday. It's English Week at my school and I have been organising some special activities for the children. We've had competitions, radio shows and cartoon screenings at lunchtime. We had been having our screenings of 'He-Man' and 'SpongeBob SquarePants' in my classroom. Unexpectedly, so many children kept turning up every day that we could never fit everyone in the room and had to put on our best bouncer demeanor and say, "Not today, buddy. Not with those shoes."

Consequently, there were a lot of disappointed youngsters every day. On Thursday, we decided to move the screening to the school's Main Hall. That way, we could squeeze in as many people as possible. About 200 kids turned up and we sat through an episode of 'SpongeBob'. Here's where it gets interesting. Now, I don't know if it's my lack of experience dealing with large groups or if the kids here are just crazier than I imagined, but as soon as the TV show finished I turned off the projector and said, "That's the end of the programme. Please stand up."

I was about to ask them to leave one group at a time, but it was too late. Time stood still and within half a second of me saying, "Stand up", 200 kids had jumped to their feet and bolted for the hallway doors at 100 miles an hour. Of course, the doors aren't wide enough to accommodate everyone, so within four seconds there was a bottleneck effect. The Grade 1 and 2 kids were getting crushed while the older kids, instead of helping them started to clamber over the top of them to try to get out the door. It was an absolute disaster! Kids were screaming, laughing and jumping on top of each other. I've never seen anything like it.

There were only a couple of teachers in the room and we all ran to the door and started barking orders and dragging kids to their feet. I saw one boy crying and feared the worst.... "Oh, no. He's broken an arm and you're going to be on the news." Luckily it turned out he was crying because someone stole his candy.

In the end, we got them all lined up again and asked them to leave one group at a time, but I thank my lucky stars that no one was hurt.

I was wondering about it again today and feeling really bad. I shouldn't have said, "Stand up". I almost killed someone. Aaaarrrrgggghhh. Just as I was contemplating this the fire alarm rang. Evidentally a Grade 3 kid had broken the fire glass and set off the alarm.... again. I looked out into the hallway and saw kids running up and down at 100 miles an hour, clambering past each other, screaming and laughing while teachers barked orders that everyone ignored, and I breathed a sigh of relief. Good, I thought. It's not just me.