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Kindergarteners are learning a nursery rhyme about school shootings in the United States

Kindergarten-aged children are learning the alphabet, numbers, colours – and a nursery rhyme with instructions to survive school shootings in the United States.

A mother’s photo shared on social media of a poster featuring the Lockdown Song in a kindergarten classroom in Somerville, Massachusetts, has revealed another sad reality of school shootings.

With 23 school shootings in the country so far this year, the song set to the tune of Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, offers instructions to the children in the event of a school shooting.

Lockdown, Lockdown, Lock the door/Shut the lights off, Say no more/Go behind the desk and hide/Wait until it’s safe inside

“Lockdown, Lockdown/It’s all done/Now it’s time to have some fun!”

Mother Georgy Cohen posted the image of the Lockdown Song on Twitter after touring her child’s soon-to-be kindergarten room.

“This should not be hanging in my soon-to-be kindergartener’s classroom,” Ms Cohen captioned the image on Twitter.

The Somerville mother told The Boston Globe that she saw the “jarring” poster while touring a kindergarten in Somerville for her five-year-old daughter.

“When I was in kindergarten, we had fire drills. It was different – we didn’t have these same types of threats,” she told the publication.

“These are the things they unfortunately have to do. I get it,” she told The Globe.

“Part of their job is to educate and keep my kids safe and I feel confident they are going to do both of those things to the best of their ability.”

The song has haunted the nation and beyond, with the post receiving more than 65,000 likes, 30,000 retweets and 2500 comments, as well as international media coverage.

“As the parent of a kindergarten teacher, that almost makes me cry,” Twitter user Kathleen O’Brien commented.

Another Twitter user said the last line of the song, And now it’s time to have some fun, made her feel sick in her stomach, while others called for gun regulation.

Somerville mayor Joseph Curtatone and superintendent Mary Skipper have not revealed which school in the district taught the Lockdown song, but told the Huffington Post the poem was a result of “the world we live in”.

“Students in Somerville and across the country know how unnatural this is,” a statement from the pair said.

“Yet we all know that one of the most important roles we have as educators and community leaders is to ensure that all of our students and staff members are safe and prepared in case of an emergency.

“This poem is an example of how one of our educators used a rhyme to help her young students stay calm and remember the key steps they would need to follow during a drill or real emergency.”

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