This week was three days of riding in the community on pre-planned routes with good teaching opportunities. There were 4 LCIs and each group had one parent volunteer to ride sweep. I got to work with the Blue groups – those with higher skill levels from the blacktop drills. They were eager to go. They ran to their bikes and quickly formed the wheel-in position and began the ABCQuick Check.The young man at the front was the best organizer of his peers ever. He had them lined up at the gate and ready to ride more quickly than I ever could.This is near the end of the planned route and I had to pull over to ask the group a question based on the chattering of one boy in particular for the past 1/4 mile. “Hey you guys! This is where I got my first primate! … Right here! This is the spot!” I was baffled. One girl asked, “What’s a primate?” Once that was answered, I learned that there’s a primate-looking character you can collect (or fight?) on Pokemon Go. Aha! I worked with four different classes through the day. We found a good water stop about halfway into the ride.I worked with the girl in the red jersey last week as she was almost becoming an independent rider. By this week, she had achieved success! Everyone was so proud of her!Oh Kenneth! Everyday he came to visit during his lunch recess. Visit? It was more like a monologue. He was quite happy that he got to ride with Pollyanna and the red group and go off campus. I asked him who taught him to ride. His answer, “Oh, I pretty much taught myself.” Really?

Thursday and Friday at Heron School in North Natomas. The leaders are Elle

and Pollyanna.Today for blacktop drills, almost everyone was ready to practice scanning, looking back over your left shoulder and calling out how many arms were raised.Before leaving the right lane position, bicycle drivers must scan, signal, scan, and merge if there is no car coming. It’s hard at first to turn your head far enough to make that judgment call, so practice is important.Meanwhile, over to the side, I worked with the weakest riders. Oh Kenneth. Here is the condensed version of his indignant Thursday speech: “If there were only two forms of transportation in the world, walking and bicycling, I’d outlaw bicycling. This is just too hard.” On Friday: “Bicycling is fun!” This after actually riding 100 feet independently back and forth about 5 times before insisting on a break. In fact, he had great balance, he just needed to keep pedaling! I would call that a hard-won success story.The following must have been a fifth-grade poem-writing project, poems were on display in every classroom.