By Robyn Rexin
Five firefighters from Vavenby Volunteer Fire Department arrived at Vavenby Primary School on Friday, Oct. 6, to go over fire safety.
First the students watched a video and then were asked questions about what they had learned. They answered well with the knowledge that they had gained from the video.
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One Grade 1 student said, “If there’s a fire you drop and roll.” Each student practiced the stop, drop, and roll and then crawled on hands and knees under a table and “out of the burning house.”
Another activity the children worked on was going into the gym in groups of three to find the hiding firefighter. He was found when he came out from “under his bed”. It was impressed on the students that they should not hide when there was a fire. Then the children hid in a dark gym and the firefighters found them with thermal imagery.
Next was a fire drill. When that was over the firefighters demonstrated how the water shoots out of the truck’s hose and what the sirens sound like.
The children took turns knocking down a tower of pop cans with the spray from the fire extinguisher. They loved doing it and the school’s driveway looked very clean afterwards.
To end the day, Ethan Meidl was chosen to go for a ride in the fire truck. Meidl was the lucky rider because he was the last one found in the darkened gym. He really liked his long ride and he got to turn on the siren and ring the bells a couple of times.
All of the students had a good and fun time with the firefighters and really enjoyed receiving their surprise bags. Each bag contained a glow stick, a Hallowe’en straw, a pencil with a monkey eraser, a bouncy ball, a card game, some play dough, clappers, a paper to make a home escape plan, a fire safety word search, and some candy.