Monday at Inderkum High School, early evening.
A couple of students were ready for a trail ride. Kathy was the leader, Lennore rode sweep.
Jeff coached another person.
Joy! Sophia became an independent rider. She was so happy. So were we.
The group returned safely!
This was a class for two levels of beginning riders. Lennore with an advanced beginner on a bike handling skills course.
Jeff worked with a beginner on gliding with no pedals attached:
Kathy worked with a beginner. We had to use blue duct tape to keep her wide-leg pants from getting caught in something.
In front of the Bike Tech classroom at Inderkum High School:
Practicing gliding:
This person actually came in on a small e-bike WITH a throttle (at far left in above picture) so she had great balance, but was dependent on the throttle. She wanted to learn how to get going using “power pedal” – here, she put her left foot on the pedal, raised it to the 10 o’clock position, eyes on the horizon, and pushed off. Success.
Our team: Christy, Lennore, Kathy:
Friday and somewhat rainy. And cold if you forgot to wear a jacket. I brought an extra rain jacket and loaned it out a couple of times.
Our intrepid team for the day: Diana, a parent volunteer who stayed for the entire day (!), Laurie, Charlie.
In front of the classroom: Pierson.
Uh-oh, a mishap at the skate park had an unfortunate result for LCI Doug – a broken ankle.
Doug’s explanation about the picture: “Weel … Scots are an optimistic people always looking for the silver lining. So here you go! I no longer need to put on kilt hose and garters just to carry my Sgian Dubh. I ken that will come in handy if I’m attacked by a wild haggis!”
The Yellow group – my favorite color – and a great group of kids each and every time.
Diana was a fantastic Sweep. An extra layer of safety.
Laurie rode Sweep for the last two classes.
at H Allen Hight Elementary, about 3 miles from my house, a 20-minute ride. Arrival time = 7:20. A tad early for this retired person. I was there for the last three days, the street rides, when four LCIs are needed.
Five 5th grade classes – on the second floor of the building, a bit of stair-climbing ahead.
Always ABCQuick Check before going for a ride. Thank you Diana, who volunteered to ride sweep for my Yellow group.
Jibe wanted to create a set of videos which demonstrated all the basic steps to teach an adult how to ride a bike. It’s different with kids - generally, you provide minimal instruction, run alongside for a while, and boom, they’ve got it. Adults are different. First you need to respect their concerns: past experience, health concerns, cultural norms. Then break everything down into logical comfortable steps. Anya, Deanna and I have taught several in-person rounds of Adult Learn to ride and think we’ve got a really good teaching strategy. We have a very high success rate. Anya wrote draft one of the script. We edited together for a couple of weeks. In the end, the words had to sound like they were coming from me. After delays due to my cold, then the weather, this Tuesday had to be the filming day. A series of storms would begin on Wednesday. We met at Wild Rose Park. Ellen/filmmaker and Sean/assistant. Sean is holding the teleprompter – the script was 6 pages long – I did not want to memorize it (was that even possible?).
There were unavoidable delays: many planes overhead, pedestrians on paths playing music or talking on phones, 30 minutes for a gardening crew on the other side of the canal to finish mowing and blowing, asking people who want to play basketball “Please be quiet. Thank you so much.” Here, I had to read the teleprompter for one camera then, at a specific point, turn toward Ellen to finish the sentence.
There will be 3 videos, each about 3 minutes long. It took six hours to complete the filming. We’re almost done here, using a downslope, both pedals are on the bike. Our light would soon fade.
Success! Done. Thanks so much to Anya for taking all these pictures and being so supportive. Fun experience.
The last two street ride days were Monday and Tuesday. Rockmont Circle is one of the best streets to visit at Halloween (also Christmas and 4th of July). These cyclists learned about the 1963 Hitchcock film The Birds – they had never heard of it – how the students at Bodega Bay School were attacked. Eek!!
The end of Project Ride Smart for 2023. The program starts up again at 3 different schools in March.
at Westlake Charter School, Monday-Friday mornings. Blacktop drills on Monday and Tuesday. After-school coaching on Wednesday afternoon – a rather large group.
Such joy when a student knows he/she can ride a bike. And a few grateful parents on the sidelines.
Thursday was the first street ride. I had the blue group.
Friday was “spooky day” in one classroom.
And two of my favorite co-workers, Deanna and Gina:
On Wednesday and Thursday mornings, I left at 7:30 am (just after sunrise!) and rode 4 miles to Westlake Charter School to help Deanna and Gina with the first day of blacktop drills.
ABCQuick Check:
After-school coaching on Wednesday. Only about 4 out of 15 need to come back for next week’s after-school coaching.
