What Were They Thinking?

There's a story in today's ParentDish about a head teacher who told his primary school kids that World War III had started, led them to a cellar and simulated a bomb explosion, then acted all surprised when they suffered nightmares about it.

Nobody in their right mind should subject young, impressionable children to that kind of mental torture. It's worse than exposing them to the X-Factor. Arguably. Depends how many weeks he kept them in their improvised bomb shelter. And how many of their classmates they had to eat before he 'fessed up.

I'm shocked, outraged and shocked.

Flashback

When we lived near the prison back in the '60s, we'd often play out in the street (this was before X-Boxes and Wiis and shit) with our pals, one of whom was four-year-old David. If one of Her Majesty's guests took an unscheduled leave of absence, they'd set off an alarm that sounded remarkably like an air raid siren. We took great delight in telling David that the Germans were coming and we'd have to run for cover. He's probably still in therapy now.

Er...

But we were only kids ourselves. A head teacher really should know better.

On the other hand, it's good practice for the Zombie Apocalypse.