Build the story around the four parts the student cannot predict: the alarm, the drop to the floor, the wait under the desk, and the walk to the assembly point. Eight to ten pages, one or two sentences each. In a 2024 Emoquest survey of 16 practitioners and parents, 94% spent 30 or more minutes on a single story, so write this one once and reuse it every October.
Why is an earthquake drill harder than a fire drill?
Because the earthquake drill asks the student to stop and stay still, and the fire drill asks them to move. Most K-5 students who have practiced a fire drill already have a script for it: alarm, line up, walk out. The earthquake sequence inverts that. The alarm goes off and the correct response is to get down on the floor in the room the student is already in, then hold position for a stretch of time with no clear end.
| Element | Fire drill | Earthquake drill |
|---|---|---|
| First action | Stand and line up | Get down on the floor |
| Body position | Upright, walking | Under a desk, holding a leg of it |
| Duration of the hardest part | The alarm itself | The wait under the desk |
| Visibility of the exit | Immediate | Delayed, sometimes several minutes |
| Peers nearby | Spread out in a line | Very close, under adjacent desks |
| Sensory load | Alarm, hallway noise | Alarm, floor contact, crowding, dust and dark under the desk |
The under-the-desk wait is the block most stories compress into a single sentence, and it is the block where the drill usually breaks. Treat it as the center of the story rather than a transition.
What does the page-by-page structure look like?
Front-load description, keep directive sentences rare, and give the waiting stretch real estate. A workable skeleton for a general education or resource classroom:
- Page 1 (descriptive): "Sometimes my school practices an earthquake drill. A drill is practice. It is not a real earthquake."
- Page 2 (descriptive): "The alarm will make a loud sound. Sometimes a voice comes on the speaker and says the words earthquake drill."
- Page 3 (directive, hedged): "I can cover my ears when the alarm is loud."
- Page 4 (descriptive): "When I hear the alarm, everyone gets down on the floor. This is called drop."
- Page 5 (descriptive): "I go under my desk. I put my hands over my head and neck. This is called cover."
- Page 6 (descriptive): "I hold on to a leg of the desk. This is called hold on."
- Page 7 (descriptive, the wait): "I stay under my desk for a little while. My classmates are under their desks too. It is quiet."
- Page 8 (perspective): "Some students feel nervous during a drill. Some students feel fine. Both are okay."
- Page 9 (descriptive): "My teacher says when it is time to come out. Then we walk outside together to the same place we go for a fire drill."
- Page 10 (affirmative): "Drills help everyone practice staying safe. I know what happens in an earthquake drill."
That draft runs roughly eight descriptive, perspective, and affirmative sentences against two directive ones, which clears the Carol Gray methodology ratio comfortably. Count them before you print.
From the 2024 Emoquest survey: "I wish I had a template that I could easily customize to change the pictures of the child/parents quickly but keep the same story." The drill stories are the clearest case for that. Fire, lockdown, tornado, and earthquake stories share about seven of ten pages. Build one shell, swap the middle.
Is there research behind using a social story for earthquake safety?
Yes, though the evidence base for this specific scenario is small and recent. A 2025 study by Ulaşman and Sivrikaya in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders used digital social stories to teach Drop, Cover, and Hold On plus safe evacuation to three primary-school students in a special education class. All three acquired the skills, generalized them to a different setting, and still had them at follow-up one, three, and five weeks after instruction.
A separate 2026 study by Gürsoy and Kot in the same journal taught earthquake safety skills through video modeling, with skills maintained and generalized to a different school setting. Those participants were 16, so the finding does not transfer directly to K-5. It does suggest pairing the story with a short video of your own classroom may help. Social narratives are rated an evidence-based practice by AFIRM across ages 3 to 22, and safety skills are one of the domains where the effect shows up most consistently.
How do you rehearse it without making the drill scarier?
Separate the sound from the sequence, and practice each one on a calm day. The alarm is a sensory event. The drop-cover-hold sequence is a motor routine. Rehearsing them together for the first time on drill day stacks both problems at once.
| Timing | What to do | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Two weeks out | Read the story once in session | Introduces the words before the event |
| Ten days out | Play a recording of your building's alarm at low volume | The specific sound stops being new |
| One week out | Practice getting under a desk in the student's own classroom | The motor routine is rehearsed in the real space |
| Two days out | Read the story with the classroom teacher present | The adult who will be there knows the plan |
| Morning of | Read it once, keep it short | Priming, not a new lesson |
| After the drill | Re-read page 10 and note what went wrong | Edits for next time while it is fresh |
Note that this is priming, not punishment. The story goes in before the drill and describes what will happen. A story written after a rough drill that lists what the student did wrong is a different document and does not belong in this workflow.
What if the student cannot get under a desk?
Write the story around the student's real plan, not the standard one. A student who uses a wheelchair, a walker, or a stander has a different sequence, often lock the wheels, lean forward, cover the head and neck, and wait for a staff member. A story that describes a desk the student cannot get under teaches a routine they will fail at.
Ask the classroom teacher and the building safety lead what the plan actually is before you write anything. The Great ShakeOut school resources include guidance for participants with disabilities and functional needs, and most districts have already documented a per-student plan. Your story should match that document word for word on the action steps.
Frequently Asked Questions
How is an earthquake drill social story different from a fire drill social story?
A fire drill moves the student out of the room right away. An earthquake drill asks the student to get down on the floor, stay under a desk, and hold still for a stretch of time before anyone moves. That waiting block is the part most students struggle with, so it needs its own pages rather than one line.
How long should the story be for a K-5 student?
Eight to ten pages with one or two sentences per page works for most K-5 students. Kindergarten and first grade usually need six to eight pages with a picture on every page. Give the under-the-desk wait at least two of those pages because it is the longest and least predictable part of the drill.
Is there research behind using a social story for earthquake safety?
Yes, though the base is small. A 2025 study in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders taught Drop, Cover, and Hold On plus safe evacuation to three primary-school students in a special education class using digital social stories. All three acquired the skills, generalized them to a different setting, and still had them at follow-up one, three, and five weeks later.
What if the student cannot get under a desk?
Write the story around whatever the student's actual plan is, not around the standard one. A student who uses a wheelchair, a walker, or a stander has a different set of steps, and a story describing a desk they cannot get under teaches the wrong sequence. Confirm the plan with the classroom teacher first, then write it.
How do you handle the alarm sound in the story?
Name it before it happens, describe it concretely, and offer an option the student is actually allowed to use. Write that the alarm is loud, that it may be a bell or a voice on the intercom, and that covering ears is permitted. Play a recording of your building's specific alarm during a calm session so the sound is not new on drill day.
How far in advance should you start reading it?
Start about two weeks before the scheduled drill and read it several times across those weeks rather than once the morning of. Many districts schedule their drill during the Great ShakeOut in October, so the date is usually known well in advance. Keep the story in the student's folder and re-read it before every drill that year.
Should the story explain what an earthquake actually is?
Keep it to one sentence and move on. Some students need to know the drill is practice for a real event, and a story that never says so can read as arbitrary. Others fixate on the possibility of a real earthquake, so watch the student's response and cut the explanation down if it becomes the part they ask about most.
One approach for school SLPs short on time is to keep a 5-tool stack: a methodology checklist for the Gray sentence ratio, a slide template you reuse for every drill, a folder of photos of your own building sorted by scenario, an AI text drafter (ChatGPT, Claude, MagicSchool, or Emoquest for one-sentence-in story output), and a delivery format your district already accepts such as Google Slides or PDF. Write the fire drill story first, then fork it three times for lockdown, tornado, and earthquake.