Tornadoes

I felt a little like Dorothy today as our entire school was placed under a tornado warning. All the students were brought down to the first floor. They sat on the floor facing the wall. With a 1,000 students on the floor, it was eerily quiet. All you could hear was crying - there were a few hysterical students. I spent my time, since I had no students assigned to me, walking and comforting these poor students. It's hard to see high school boys (and girls) scared to death. I prayed for my own children in a near-by school. You feel so helpless when you don't know what is going on with them. The tornado was a few miles from our school traveling up I-85. This was about 2:00 PM.

The warning lasted for about an hour (?) and we were able to return to class. Upon our return, I sang songs from the Wizard of Oz to my class (sweet little 9th graders!) They had a good time and even joined in with me when they knew the words!! It did little to quieten their anxiety about their parents and this evening.

Parents were annoyed when the administrators would not release the students during the warning. What were the parents thinking? That it was safer on the highway with the tornado??? The parents in the office were asked to join the students on the floor in the hallway.

The tornado went by us, leaving us a downpour of rain. It did touch down in one my co-workers yard uprooting several trees and tearing up her fence. I hope we do not have a repeat of this event any time soon.