Healthy, stealthy and wise

Michael Miller

Eastbluff Elementary School, the smallest campus in the Corona del

Mar zone, doesn’t have much of an athletic field. When students take

a 15-minute walk every day, they go in circles around the

hexagon-shaped buildings that house the school’s classrooms.

Those minutes of exercise add up.

On Friday, the President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports

presented the school with a Bronze Award for walking 4,000 minutes

over the last year -- an undertaking Principal Charlene Metoyer

dubbed the “Walk to Washington.” At an assembly, the school passed

out bronze medals to every student who had participated in the

program.

“‘Walk to Washington’ has been a phenomenal experience for every

student in our school,” Metoyer said. “I’m excited to think that all

this good health will spread to other schools.”

One year ago, Eastbluff -- led by parent volunteer Janice Morrow

-- started a physical fitness unit at the end of each day. For 15

minutes after class, students loosened up by strolling around the

blacktop, while also learning about geography. As the year

progressed, teachers held lessons on the Grand Canyon, the Rocky

Mountains and other national landmarks between Newport Beach and the

nation’s capitol.

In the end, the students’ combined walking time of 4,000 minutes

was enough to net 20,000 points from the President’s Council, a

Washington, D.C.-based group chaired by former NFL star Lynn Swann.

Next year, Morrow said, the school will increase its physical

activity to shoot for a Silver or Gold Award.

Medal or not, students found the daily walk at Eastbluff to be

welcome exercise.

“It’s kind of fun, because you get to talk to your friends and not

do much classwork,” said sixth-grader Taryn Greenberg, 11, although

she added, “I don’t like it on a hot day.”

Lauren Young, the president of Eastbluff’s PTA, said that her son,

Adam, a fourth-grader, cited the walk as one of his favorite parts of

the day.

“One of the things he talks about when he comes home is ‘Walk to

Washington,’” Young said. “He likes to walk with the special-ed

kids.”

On the same day as the Eastbluff assembly, Harbor View Elementary

announced that it would start a walking program of its own next fall

for the President’s Council. Principal Mellissia Christensen said she

hoped the program would reach out to students who didn’t exercise

much.

“Our kids are very active in recess and after-school sports, but

not all kids, so we’re going to try to target every child in the fall

-- not to mention a lot of staff members, including myself,”

Christensen said.

* IN THE CLASSROOM is a weekly feature in which Daily Pilot

education writer Michael Miller visits a campus in the Newport-Mesa

area and writes about his experience. He can be reached by e-mail at

michael.miller@latimes.com.