Funny Conversation...

Camden's best friend here is German. He has become a part of the family, and we all adore him. He is one of the funniest kids you will ever meet, and when he and Camden get together there is always tons of laughter. Sometimes, the laughter is simply because of the translation of something or because of the serious or not so serious tone in the way that something is said. I mention all of this, just because the tone, translation, and content all contributed to making the following conversation I overheard at breakfast, very funny....

Camden was telling me that he couldn't work on his Science Project in class because they had a fire drill (one of many by the way that the American school must conduct each year - I know this because when I student taught, we had at least 7 just in one semester).

His friend says, "what is a fire drill"

Bailey and Camden explain it to him, and then started talking about the "stop, drop, and roll" phrase that has been engrained in all of our heads  since we we began school.  To give you a little background too, German kids know how to deal with fire (even Mia was taught in 1st grade about using your foot to stomp out a fire or using sand, and where to place candles in windows etc.) - a totally different culture...

Anyway, Camden's friend comes back and says, "we do not have anything like "stop, drop, and roll" in the German school. We only have the Drama team come in with; fake smoke, stretchers, fake blood, polizei and fire trucks (totally unannounced to teachers, so everyone thinks it is real), as a "test" to give us real practice for what we would do in a real emergency. All of the 5th grade girls were crying".

To back up a bit, Camden and Bailey went to his school last year, and they came home quite early one day, shocked and surprised, saying that there were firetrucks, stretchers, a strange odor, and smoke and they weren't sure what happened, but rumor was something horrible happened in a science lab" We never found exactly what had actually happened. Now though, it all makes sense. The way his friend tells a story is hilarious too, so to hear it, I was practically on the floor in laughter.

I then got to thinking about what kind of law suits would be filed if this totally unannounced life like performance had been given at the Ameircan School. I really got to thinking about it though, because in a society where kids have so much freedom, it is fantastic for them (especially in today's society) to consider what they would do to prepare themselves in a real emergency - How they would react, where they would go, who they would call, what they would do. I thought it was brilliant. And told by his friend, the explanation of what they do at his school was priceless! So different!!