I was sitting at dinner with a friend recently while her nine-year-old daughter Gigi, a classmate of my own daughter, told a long rambling story about her day at school. In typical mom listening fashion, I smiled and nodded while catching only about every third word of what she was saying.

“Really?” I asked encouragingly as I took a sip of chardonnay. “What happened next?”

“Well,” she said. “The kids in Chinese class said the guy actually banged on their door and when they looked up they could see his gun!”

“Uh huh,” I responded. “Wait. What?”

“In our classroom we couldn’t see him because we were in the cubbies," she went on, "but the Chinese classroom doesn’t have cubbies, so they had to hide under their desks.”

Gigi’s mother and I looked across the table at each other trying to make sense of what we’d just heard, while Gigi moved seamlessly into a story about her upcoming hip hop dance recital.

“Wait a second Gigi,” I stopped her. “Tell me that story again.”

This time, as I paid attention Gigi explained about Mr. L Drills, which it turns out are like fire drills but for terrorist attacks. If someone comes into their school intending to do harm, the principal calmly announces over the loud speaker that “Mr. L is in the building,” and like a fire alarm the announcement prompts the students to jump out of their seats, lock their doors and windows, and hide en masse in the coat closet.

She told the story matter-of-factly, as though she were recounting the outcome of a kickball game or a new way to do math facts. It was just another in the series of activities taught at school that day.

Neither I nor Gigi’s mom was quite sure how to react to the fact that our children are being taught terrorism response techniques in school.

I suppose, having read enough heart-wrenching stories about students being shot pointblank in classrooms by disgruntled classmates and random lunatics, I’m happy my children are being given this kind of guidance. There is the remote chance that this lesson will save their lives one day.

But at what cost?

The next afternoon I sat down with my own two kids and their cousin who all attend school together and asked them: “Are you having terrorist drills at school?”

“Oh,” they said knowingly. “You mean ‘Mr. L has entered the building.’ Sure, we did that on Tuesday.”

Like Gigi, the three of them excitedly  recounted the tale of crouching in their coat closets while the principal went from room to room, rattling classroom doors to see if they were locked and checking through windows to be sure no tiny feet were sticking out to alert Mr. L The Terrorist that students were inside.

Having learned long ago that my kids pick up on my emotions based on how I phrase my questions, I asked them very neutrally, “How do you feel about these drills?”

They responded with a collective shrug. “Our school is in a really good neighborhood so I don’t think anything bad like that would happen,” my niece assured me.

“It’s good because it tells us what to do if a burglar comes into the school,” added my nine year old knowingly.

But my eleven-year-old was a little more pragmatic. “It’s scary to think about someone coming into our school with a gun, and it makes me wonder if something like that has happened somewhere that they aren’t telling us about.”

I thought about their answers for a while and decided they were right. It’s good that they know what to do in a bad situation, even if they don’t entirely understand what that situation might be.

Just as I’ve told them many times what to do if they get lost in a mall or approached by a stranger in a park, this training is good for them. They don’t need to know the gory details of Columbine or Northern Illinois University to know what they need to do to be safe.

Over the years Stranger Danger and Mr. Yuck have taught my kids many valuable lessons about how to keep themselves safe. I suppose Mr. L is just another lesson they need to learn in the journey of their lives.