Teachers were heroic protectors [View all]

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There are multiple stories coming out of Moore, Okla., of teachers putting their own lives on the line to protect their students, just as teachers in Newtown and other schools risked and sometimes lost their lives for students.

During the worst of the tornado that destroyed Moore, teachers shielded children with their own bodies even as roofs collapsed around them, according to educators and parents of children who survived.

David Wheeler's son Gabriel, 8, is in third grade at Briarwood Elementary School in Moore, one of two schools destroyed. Students were initially told to huddle in the hallways, but Gabriel's teacher, Julie Simon, said it wasn't safe and ushered them to a closet.

Simon shielded Gabriel with her arms and held him down as the building's roof collapsed, Wheeler said. The tornado's force was so strong it sucked the glasses off the faces of some students. Gabriel suffered cuts and bruises and had gravel embedded in his head — but was otherwise unscathed, his father said.

more . . . http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/05/21/teachers-as-heroic-protectors/2346631/